Elon Musk, one of the brightest minds of his generation, is saying it, so it must be trueWomen, eh? They're simply not to be trusted. Eve ate that apple; Pandora opened that horrible little box; and now women are to blame for the devastating wildfires in California. I know that sounds like a ridiculous thing to say, but it's what Elon Musk, one of the brightest minds of his generation - and one of the most powerful people on Earth - is saying, so it must be true. Continue reading...
John Vaillant, the author of Fire Weather, explains why fires such as those in Los Angeles are different from those beforeWhen writing about the hot, dry Santa Ana winds and how they affect the behavior and imaginations of southern Californians, Joan Didion once said: The winds show us how close to the edge we are."I've lived here my entire life. I evacuated my family's hillside home as a teenager. I've experienced the surrealism of watching ash rain down from the sky more times than I can count. But there is something different, supercharged, about the hurricane-force winds that fueled this week's catastrophic wildfires in Los Angeles. Continue reading...
We fell in love with the power and speed that fossil fuels brought us. But the price being paid in California, and around the world, has become too highZero per cent contained. In layperson's terms, that means out of control and burning at will". It's a common designation for a wildfire - in the wild. But when a fire like this enters an urban area such as Los Angeles County, the most highly populated metropolitan area in the US, it becomes an exploding bomb, and this one has been detonating since last Tuesday.By now, the energy release from this wind-driven, drought-fuelled firestorm turned urban conflagration is into the megatons, and the nuclear-scale destruction is there for all to see: block after block and neighbourhood after neighbourhood levelled - roughly 12,000 structures destroyed or rendered uninhabitable, 55 sq miles of city and mountain burnt, nearly 200,000 residents evacuated - so far. There is more to come. Continue reading...
Common Wealth thinktank warns that communities and taxpayer may have to pick up pieces when production endsNorth Sea oil and gas must be brought under greater public control to avoid a cliff-edge collapse of the industry and secure a sustainable future for workers and communities, according to a report.Under the current private ownership model the inevitable end of North Sea oil and gas production - whether through government action or the lack of viable oilfields - will lead to private companies abruptly abandoning the basin, leaving frontline communities and the state to deal with the social and economic consequences, the authors predict. Continue reading...
Every barrel of oil, every cubic meter of gas, and every ton of coal burned brings us closer to environmental catastropheApocalyptic flames and smoke are raging through southern California in the worst fire in Los Angeles county's history. At least seven people have died. Thousands of structures have been destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes. The private forecaster AccuWeather estimates initial damage and economic loss at more than $50bn and has the potential to be the costliest wildfire disaster in American history. The impacts of the disruption and loss faced by community members is incalculable.While some media outlets are discussing the link between the Los Angeles fires and the climate crisis, the president-elect Donald Trump and rightwing media are using this devastating event to foster misinformation including denying the role of climate crisis. Continue reading...
by Patrick Greenfield, Libby Brooks and Severin Carre on (#6TFR0)
Environmentalists condemn unauthorised releases as reckless' and highly irresponsible'For a brief moment this week, lynx have been roaming the Scottish Highlands once again. But this was not the way conservationists had hoped to end their 1,000-year absence.On Wednesday, Police Scotland received reports of two lynx in a forest in the Cairngorms national park, sparking a frantic search. That episode ended in less than a day. Both animals were quickly captured by experts from the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS) and taken to quarantine facilities at Highland wildlife park. Continue reading...
by Severin Carrell Scotland editor and Tom Ambrose on (#6TFD1)
Second pair of illegally released animals safely captured in Cairngorms after they were spotted on camera trapsTwo more lynx abandoned in the Cairngorms have been safely captured, the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland said on Friday.Two of the illegally released animals were captured on Thursday after being sighted in the Dell of Killiehuntly near Kingussie in the Scottish Highlands. Continue reading...
Noaa says last year was the warmest since records began in 1850 and Nasa concurs: The long-term trends are very clear'It was the hottest year ever recorded for the world's lands and oceans in 2024, US government scientists have confirmed, providing yet another measure of how the climate crisis is pushing humanity into temperatures we have previously never experienced.Last year was the hottest in global temperature records stretching back to 1850, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa announced, with the worldwide average 1.46C (2.6F) warmer than the era prior to humans burning huge volumes of planet-heating fossil fuels. Continue reading...
Events in California reveal how political obstruction is deepening a climate crisis that needs urgent action to prevent it becoming an irreversible disasterThe wildfires ravaging Los Angeles have killed at least 10 people, displaced 180,000 and scorched about 40 square miles - an inferno driven by fierce winds and severe drought in what should be California's wet season. It is a sobering reminder that the climate crisis is driving wildfires to become more frequent, intense and destructive - leaving ruined lives, homes and livelihoods in their wake. The US president Joe Biden responded by mobilising federal aid. By contrast the president-elect, Donald Trump, a convicted felon who was criminally sentenced on Friday, used the disaster to spread disinformation and stoke political division.The climate crisis knows no national borders. Deadly floods in Spain, Hawaii's fires and east Africa's devastating drought show nowhere is safe from its effects. Countries must work toward the global common interest and beyond their narrow national interests. The scale of the climate emergency is such that there is a case to view all crises through a green lens. Instead Mr Trump's denialism works to foment distrust about the science. He's not just aiming to delay the onset of truth. He wants to demolish it. It's a familiar playbook: the fossil fuel industry knows the reality of the climate emergency but chooses profit over responsibility, effectively deceiving the public while the planet burns. Continue reading...
To solve the climate crisis, power must flow away from the billionaire classWhen I feel uncertain, I find it's helpful to write down things I know to be true. Fossil fuels are causing irreversible planetary overheating. Overheating threatens essentially all life on Earth. Oil and gas executives knew this but they chose to systematically lie and block a climate transition. They continue to make this choice.I choose to focus my energy on the climate crisis because a habitable planet is a prerequisite for everything worth fighting for, and because the prospect of losing a planet feels horrific and sad to me in a primal way that I can't express with words. I'm also simply in love with the Earth. But planetary overheating is really just the most geophysical symptom of extractive colonial capitalism - billionairism" - a system designed to pump wealth from the poor to the rich, creating billionaires, the healthcare crisis, the housing crisis, genocide, hierarchies like racism and patriarchy, and a great deal of suffering.Peter Kalmus is a climate scientist and author of Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution Continue reading...
At least 45 whales were entangled by fishing ropes and line on the east coast in 2024. 'There's a lot of times when we'll get out to an entanglement where we just think, this animal should just probably be put to sleep,' says Sea World's head of marine sciences, Wayne Phillips.The constant drag of rope and floats slowly causes a whale to succumb to exhaustion. 'It's probably the worst way of dying for any marine ... animal,' marine scientist Olaf Meynecke, says. 'It takes weeks to several months until they actually die' Continue reading...
Those who lived in regions with firefighting training areas earned about 1.7% less later in life, research showsEarly life exposure to toxic PFAS forever chemicals" could affect economic success in adulthood, new first-of-its-kind research suggests.The Iowa State University and US Census Bureau working paper compared the earnings, college graduation rates and birth weights of two groups of children - those raised around military installations that had firefighting training areas, and those who lived near bases with no firefighting training site. Continue reading...
A similar campaign of rumors and lies was seen after the North Carolina hurricane, with DEI a primary targetAs Los Angeles firefighters battle ongoing blazes, prominent rightwing figures are spreading bigoted criticism of the response and lies about who is to blame, including that the fire is raging because of diversity within the fire department.The misinformation echoes the claims that plagued the North Carolina hurricane response. Both disasters led to outrage, which partisan actors seized upon to advance their political goals, muddying the already confusing information ecosystem that accompanies a fast-moving news event. Continue reading...
by Damian Carrington Environment editor on (#6TF81)
Highest recorded temperatures supercharged extreme weather - with worse to come, EU data showsClimate breakdown drove the annual global temperature above the internationally agreed 1.5C target for the first time last year, supercharging extreme weather and causing misery to millions of people".The average temperature in 2024 was 1.6C above preindustrial levels, data from the EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) shows. That is a jump of 0.1C from 2023, which was also a record hot year and represents levels of heat never experienced by modern humans. Continue reading...
It's possible for massive fires to burn in Australian cities. Planning needs to reflect thisAs the Los Angeles wildfires rage, we are watching a disaster unfold in real time.We knew this would happen eventually. We have moved from possible futures to these things now happening. The deferment has ended. Continue reading...
by Damien Gayle Environment correspondent on (#6TF5G)
Emissions caused by wealthiest 1% so far this year would take someone from poorest 50% three years to createThe world's richest 1% have already used up their fair share of the global carbon budget for 2025, just 10 days into the year.In less than a week and a half, the consumption habits of an individual from this monied elite had already caused, on average, 2.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, according to analysis by Oxfam GB. It would take someone from the poorest 50% of humanity three years to create the same amount of pollution. Continue reading...
McNeese State University in Louisiana building a liquefied natural gas center, prompting fears of corporate capture'One of Louisiana's top public universities has prompted concerns about corporate capture" over its expanding relationship with the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, despite environmental warnings about pollution and prolonging fossil fuel use.As the US's LNG boom gained momentum in south-west Louisiana, McNeese State University courted the industry to help launch a new LNG Center of Excellence currently under construction, hired a director doubling as an LNG industry lobbyist, and approached federal regulators to co-locate their own research center at the university, according to emails obtained via public records requests by DeSmog and the Guardian. Continue reading...
by Mark Brown North of England correspondent on (#6TEXP)
Panels installed on south quire roof expected to meet a third of church's electricity needsAnd God said, Let there be light" - and on a witheringly cold winter morning there was light, as the Dean of York carried out a rooftop blessing for the minster's 184 new solar panels.The sky was blue and the sun shone when the Very Rev Dominic Barrington led the blessing ceremony as the panels were switched on for the first time. They were absolutely gleaming," said one witness. Continue reading...
The current fires in Los Angeles are reminders of the costs of forgettingThe fires raging in and around Malibu are huge, and they're terrible, and they're also the latest in a series of catastrophic fires in Los Angeles county and the region, the latest consequence of heat and drought and wind that have long created the region's volatile fire weather.The climate crisis has made it hotter and drier and made wildfire worse here and across the west and around the world, but this region's ecology has always been wedded to fire. Homes built in and around natural landscapes - canyons, chaparral coastal hills, forests, mountainsides - with a history of wildfire that are pretty much guaranteed to burn again sooner or later create the personal tragedies and losses and the pressure for fire crews to try to contain the blazes. But suppressing the blazes lets the fuel load build up, meaning that fire will be worse when it comes.Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. She is the author of Orwell's Roses and co-editor with Thelma Young Lutunatabua of the climate anthology Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility Continue reading...
With 2024 set to go down as the hottest year on record, we know that what is coming is truly horrifyingThe past 12 months have seen our world enter new territory. Last year will go down as the first time that the global average temperature exceeded 1.5C above preindustrial times over a calendar year. We could crash permanently through the 1.5C guardrail within the next five years, and shatter the 2C limit as soon as 2034. This will almost certainly result in the tipping points for collapse of the Greenland and west Antarctic ice sheets being crossed, committing us to the drowning of coastal towns and cities.In years to come, we will look back at this time and ask the same question that future generations will ask: why didn't we stop this catastrophe?Bill McGuire is professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL and author of Hothouse Earth: an Inhabitant's GuideRoger Hallam is co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain and Just Stop OilDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...
Cities cancel flights and school in anticipation as Dallas, Texas, is expected to get a year's worth of snowParts of Texas and the US south are getting hit with yet another winter storm.The winter storm will hit central and northern Texas with 1-6in (3-15cm) of snow, according to the latest update from AccuWeather. Pockets of snowfall from 6-12in are expected to hit north of Dallas, Texas; to Arkansas, Tennessee and eastern North Carolina through Friday. Continue reading...
New rule hailed as major step toward reining in source of local toxic air pollution that hits low-income neighborhoodsThe EPA plans to require the nation's municipal waste incinerators to monitor for dangerous air emissions, a move environmental groups have hailed as a major step toward reining in a staggering source of localized toxic air pollution that most frequently hits low-income neighborhoods.Municipal incinerators' stacks often spew hazardous pollutants like dioxins, particulate matter, PFAS, carbon monoxide, acid gases, or nitrogen oxides. The substances are linked to cancer, developmental disorders and other serious diseases, but still are burned with limited or patchwork oversight. Continue reading...
by Libby Brooks Scotland correspondent on (#6TEHF)
The wild cats were humanely trapped using cameras near baited traps and are in quarantineTwo lynx that were illegally released into the Scottish Highlands have been captured overnight and are said to be in good health.Police had issued a warning to the public on Wednesday evening not to approach the wild cats, after several sightings in the Drumguish area, near Kingussie. Continue reading...
Environment secretary Steve Reed urged to bring in full and swift ban' to protect health of people, wildlife and petsWildlife charities have called on the government to ban the sale and use of lead in ammunition used for outdoor shooting.The Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust (WWT), RSPB, Wildlife and Countryside Link, Chem Trust and Wild Justice have sent an open letter to the environment secretary, Steve Reed, asking for a 18-month transition period for a ban on lead in ammunition sales. Continue reading...
Conditions for a January LA firestorm have not existed before now, writes a meteorologist and climate journalistAn exceptional mix of environmental conditions has created an ongoing firestorm without known historical precedent across southern California this week.The ingredients for these infernos in the Los Angeles area, near-hurricane strength winds and drought, foretell an emerging era of compound events - simultaneous types of historic weather conditions, happening at unusual times of the year, resulting in situations that overwhelm our ability to respond. Continue reading...
A failure of justice, and draconian Tory law, put Gaie Delap in prison. A failure of government is keeping her thereGaie Delap will turn 78 on Friday, in Eastwood Park prison, Gloucestershire. Sentenced to 20 months last August for climbing a gantry over the M25 for Just Stop Oil, she was released in November to serve the rest of her sentence on a home detention curfew. But the electronic tag that she was required to wear couldn't go round her ankle because she has deep-vein thrombosis and it might have risked causing her a stroke. It couldn't go round her wrist because they couldn't find a tag small enough, which people keep saying is because she's frail. Delap hates being called frail. Her wrist is a perfectly reasonable size, 14-and-a-half centimetres. It's the wrist-tag design that's wanting. The topsy-turvy world where a government contractor, Serco, can fail and fail again, while a citizen with a social purpose gets called back to prison five days before Christmas to atone for that failure, isn't even the most absurd thing about this story.Delap was engaged in direct action to raise awareness about the climate emergency, and the day citizens stop doing that is the day that progressive politics might as well give up and go home. Whatever pretzel twists Labour ministers have to perform to sound as if they're on the side of the decent, honest commuter, while simultaneously signalling that they understand the scale of the climate crisis, they must surely remember this: the trade union movement, the peace movement, the suffragette movement, the civil rights movement, the climate justice movement; every known movement of change has relied on non-violent action to disrupt the status quo.Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnistDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...
Hollywood stars once came for the big-game fishing, but the return of a host of species to the depleted waters around Britain's coast is a cause for quiet optimismFrom the outside, the Tunny Club looks like any other seaside fish and chip shop. A short walk from Scarborough harbour, only the photos of John Wayne and Errol Flynn on the wall betray the shop's fleeting history as a global centre for big-game fishing.In the 1930s, film stars and the ultra-wealthy flocked to the Yorkshire seaside resort for their chance to catch the enormous bluefin tuna - known as tunny" - lurking off the North Sea coast. In 1933, aristocrat Lorenzo Mitchell-Henry reeled in what remains the largest fish ever caught in British waters: a 386kg bluefin tuna. Continue reading...
Wildfires continued to burn across LA, with at least five people killed and more than 1,500 buildings destroyed. A new blaze broke out in the Hollywood Hills and evacuation orders were extended to Santa Monica. Winds had eased, but the danger was far from over
The firefighters earn $5.80-$10.24 per day plus $1 an hour when responding to active emergencies, according to CDCRHundreds of incarcerated firefighters are helping battle the destructive blazes that are rapidly spreading across southern California as a powerful windstorm devastates the region.The California department of corrections and rehabilitation (CDCR) said on Wednesday that it had deployed 395 imprisoned firefighters across 29 crews while the county fights multiple out-of-control blazes fueled by extreme winds and dry conditions. The incarcerated crews are embedded with the California department of forestry and fire protection (Cal Fire) and its nearly 2,000 firefighters, who have been stretched thin from several simultaneous emergencies. Continue reading...
Wildfires continued to grow in Los Angeles as overtaxed fire crews battled three major out-of-control blazes that have killed at least five people. The largest and most devastating so far have been the Palisades fire and the Eaton fire, but other blazes, particularly the growing Hurst fire and the Hollywood Hills-based Sunset fire, are continuing to worry Los Angeles residents Continue reading...
Huge wildfires roaring through the Los Angeles area of Pacific Palisades has left the neighborhood in ruins. Resident Sanah Chung left his Pacific Palisades home when a mandatory evacuation order was placed but returned to protect his home from the fire. 'I know this looks pretty stupid, but If I can save one ember from burning down my house, I'll take the risk,' said Chung.
Environment secretary says Labour is aiming for half of food procured for the public sector to come from British farmsFood supplied to the public sector will be monitored for the first time to see how much was grown by British farmers, the environment secretary is to announce.Steve Reed will speak at the Oxford Farming Conference on Thursday in an attempt to reset his relationship with the farming sector after a tumultuous start in his role. Farmers have been angry about issues including changes to the inheritance tax regime, cuts to EU-derived subsidies and delays to flood payments for submerged farms. Continue reading...
In new paper in the New England Journal of Medicine, leading researchers to propose action to protect kidsChildren are suffering and dying from diseases that emerging scientific research has linked to chemical exposures, findings that require urgent revamping of laws around the world, according to a new paper published on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).Authored by more than 20 leading public health researchers, including one from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and another from the United Nations, the paper lays out a large body of evidence" linking multiple childhood diseases to synthetic chemicals and recommends a series of aggressive actions to try to better protect children. Continue reading...
There are significant health benefits to trying new things, whatever the activity - and there is always more to learnThere is a paradox to being 20 metres under the ocean. It is a place of calm and wonderment. I am immersed in a foreign world, with a new watery sky above me. There is a sense of serenity, blissful peace as countless colourful fish glide past.Only the tranquillity is deceiving. As a novice diver, my mind ticks over in hyperdrive. All that stands between me and an agonising fate is the tank of oxygen on my back (and, hopefully, the dive guide's spare air). Continue reading...
Lawsuit challenges the federal government's December 2024 decision to add restrictions to offer of drilling leasesThe US state of Alaska has sued the Biden administration for what it calls violations of a congressional directive to allow oil and gas development in a portion of the federal Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).The federal lawsuit in the US district court in Alaska filed on Monday challenges the federal government's December 2024 decision to add restrictions to an offer of oil and gas drilling leases in an area known as the coastal plain. Continue reading...
by Damien Gayle Environment correspondent on (#6TDQP)
Exodus from target-setting group is attempt to head off anti-woke' attacks from rightwing politicians, say analysts Business live - latest updatesThe six biggest banks in the US have all quit the global banking industry's net zero target-setting group, with the imminent inauguration of Donald Trump as president expected to bring political backlash against climate action.JP Morgan is the latest to withdraw from the UN-sponsored net zero banking alliance (NZBA), following Citigroup, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs. All six have left since the start of December. Continue reading...