Alpine Kea with damaged beak teaches himself to use pebbles for grooming, in a first under scientific observationBruce, a disabled alpine parrot from New Zealand, may just be one of the most unique birds in the world. He comes from good stock – the Kea, the only alpine parrot, is considered to be among the most intelligent birds. When they aren’t dismantling tourists’ cars, stealing passports or occasionally killing sheep, they are known to weigh up probabilities to help them make choices.Related: Hear be kiwis: New Zealand celebrates as distinctive cry of iconic bird returns Continue reading...

Travelers, tour guides and service workers share how years of record-high tourism levels are reshaping popular destinationsOn a two-lane road leading to Acadia national park’s picturesque Bass Harbor head lighthouse, traffic has come to a standstill. A row of cars wait to enter the parking lot, with one local turning around altogether to try again on a less crowded day.Visitors have flooded national parks this summer as Covid-19 regulations eased throughout the US. The National Park Service reported that half of recreation visits are occurring within just 5% of all parks, with significant congestion concentrated in the most popular 12 to 15 high-profile destinations. Continue reading...

The best of this week’s wildlife pictures, including a coloured photo of Tasmanian tiger, humpback whale and friendly donkey Continue reading...

Fixating on ‘net zero’ means betting the future of life on Earth that someone will invent some kind of whiz-bang tech to draw down COThe world has by and large adopted “net zero by 2050” as its de facto climate goal, but two fatal flaws hide in plain sight within those 16 characters. One is “net zero.” The other is “by 2050”.These two flaws provide cover for big oil and politicians who wish to preserve the status quo. Together they comprise a deadly prescription for inaction and catastrophically high levels of irreversible climate and ecological breakdown. Continue reading...

Motion at Marseille summit wins global support for warning of permanent biodiversity loss and unknown effect on ecosystemA motion calling for a ban on deep-sea mining has been adopted in Marseille at the world’s biggest biodiversity summit since the pandemic, after an overwhelmingly supportive vote by governments and civil society groups.Related: Deep-sea ‘gold rush’: secretive plans to carve up the seabed decried Continue reading...

Price of durum wheat up by 90% after drought devastates harvest in Canada, one of the biggest producersShoppers can expect to pay more for their pasta in coming months amid shortages of its key ingredient following a disastrous growing season.A scramble for durum wheat has pushed the price up nearly 90% this summer after drought and soaring temperatures hit farms in Canada, one of the biggest producers. Continue reading...

New carbon capture technology should be welcomed. But weaning the world off coal, oil and gas is what matters mostThe switching on of the world’s largest carbon capture and storage plant, in Iceland, is a glimmer of hope in a bleak climate landscape. The amount of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere by this new machine will be tiny: 4,000 tonnes a year, which is equivalent to that produced by 870 cars. Still, the project brings a step closer the possibility that significant amounts of carbon dioxide could, one day, be removed from the atmosphere.The significant risks that such technological developments carry must be addressed head-on. The danger is that they are a displacement activity from the massive and necessary task of reducing and then eliminating emissions (with any residual emissions offset or, if carbon capture technologies are scaled up, removed). This distraction need not be deliberate, although fossil fuel producers have consistently undermined climate action by promoting the idea that technological solutions will eventually make calls to decarbonise obsolete. Continue reading...

Michelle Ananda-Rajah says climate change and Covid will be front and centre in a ‘watershed election’

Scheme that uses locally harvested woodchip to heat homes of retired sailors yields biodiversity benefitsA low-carbon co-operative that heats the homes of retired sailors has helped one of Britain’s rarest butterflies return to a nearby wood.Springbok Sustainable Wood Heat Co-operative is a unique scheme using woodchip harvested from woodland within yards of 49 households in Surrey to provide heating and hot water. Continue reading...

Dutch farmers could be forced to sell land and reduce the amount of animals they keep to help lower ammonia pollutionDutch politicians are considering plans to force hundreds of farmers to sell up and cut livestock numbers, to reduce damaging ammonia pollution.After the highest Dutch administrative court found in 2019 that the government was breaking EU law by not doing enough to reduce excess nitrogen in vulnerable natural areas, the country has been battling what it is calling a “nitrogen crisis”. Continue reading...

Activists say almost 2,000 people on waiting list for place to stay owing to lack of affordable accommodationScotland-based climate campaigners have condemned “the most exclusionary Cop ever”, as they reveal a waiting list of nearly 2,000 delegates and activists who were still seeking affordable accommodation for November’s summit in Glasgow.The Cop26 Homestay Network, which was launched in May, and is described by organisers as a “non-corporate Airbnb”, aims to match local hosts from across the central belt of Scotland with visiting climate change campaigners, scientists and non-governmental organisations. Continue reading...

Widespread use of chemicals that can harm wildlife means French state has failed to protect the country’s flora and fauna, say NGOSThe French government is being threatened with court action by two NGOs who accuse it of failing to meet its obligations to protect nature.Notre Affaire à Tous and Pollinis have issued an ultimatum to the French state for failing to tackle the biodiversity crisis by implementing adequate laws and regulations. The announcement was made at the IUCN world conservation congress in the French port of Marseille and will be followed by a civil disobedience rally. Continue reading...

Labor attacks Coalition for pressing Britain to remove explicit temperature targets from free trade deal

Offshore energy boom in China will grow world’s windfarm capacity by more than 12GW in 2021Windfarm installations are expected to double to record global levels this year, after a short-lived Covid-19 slowdown, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC).The group’s annual report found that the world’s offshore windfarm capacity grew by 6.1GW last year, down slightly from a record 6.24GW in 2019, but would rebound to more than 12GW in 2021 powered by an offshore wind boom in China. Continue reading...

Operators say the Orca plant can suck 4,000 tonnes of CO2 out of the air every year and inject it deep into the ground to be mineralisedThe world’s largest plant designed to suck carbon dioxide out of the air and turn it into rock has started running, the companies behind the project said on Wednesday.The plant, named Orca after the Icelandic word “orka” meaning “energy”, consists of four units, each made up of two metal boxes that look like shipping containers. Continue reading...

Strong lobbying by fossil fuel industries is drowning out the corporate voices that support climate action, analysts say

Startup energy firm’s bid to send up to 60,000 tonnes of woodchips to Japan for burning in power plants condemned by conservation group

Defence ties will also be on the agenda when Marise Payne and Peter Dutton meet with their American counterpartsThe Morrison government is expected to come under further pressure over climate policy when the foreign minister and the defence minister meet face-to-face with their US counterparts in Washington next week.Marise Payne and Peter Dutton flew out of Australia on Wednesday evening bound for Indonesia, the first stop in a two-week trip that will also include meetings with counterparts in India and South Korea. Continue reading...

UK-Australia deal also criticised for allowing import of beef produced to lower standardsGreen campaigners have criticised the UK government for apparently removing references to the temperature goals of the Paris climate agreement from a prospective trade deal with Australia.According to Sky News in the UK, the trade deal – which was agreed in principle in June – was set to contain references to the Paris goals of limiting global heating to 2C above pre-industrial levels, with an aspiration to a lower limit of 1.5C. Continue reading...

At least 866 arrested since April, as police condemned for violence against protesters defending Vancouver Island’s ancient forestsA string of protests against old-growth logging in western Canada have become the biggest act of civil disobedience in the country’s history, with the arrest of least 866 people since April.The bitter fight over the future of Vancouver Island’s diminishing ancient forests – in which activists used guerrilla methods of resistance such as locking their bodies to the logging road and police responded by beating, dragging and pepper-spraying demonstrators – has surpassed the previous record of arrests set in the 1990s at the anti-logging protests dubbed the “War in the Woods”. Continue reading...

Analysis shows future is bleak for fossil fuel industry with trillions of dollars of assets at stakeThe vast majority of fossil fuel reserves owned today by countries and companies must remain in the ground if the climate crisis is to be ended, an analysis has found.The research found 90% of coal and 60% of oil and gas reserves could not be extracted if there was to be even a 50% chance of keeping global heating below 1.5C, the temperature beyond which the worst climate impacts hit. Continue reading...

Defra denies claim and says culled animal has ‘TB-like lesions’ and awaits further investigationsA fresh row has broken out between the owner of Geronimo the alpaca and the government over the results of an initial postmortem examination of the culled animal.Lawyers acting for Helen Macdonald have said the preliminary gross postmortem findings, reviewed by veterinary surgeons, are negative for visible lesions typical of bovine tuberculosis (TB). Continue reading...

PfP and MoneyPlus cease trading as power prices reach record highs, leaving 100,000 customers without a supplierThe record energy market surge has claimed its first casualties after two UK suppliers collapsed, leaving almost 100,000 customers without an energy supplier.Related: Gone with the wind: why UK firms could miss out on the offshore boom Continue reading...

‘New alliance with equal rights’ needed, say indigenous delegates at IUCN biodiversity conferenceIndigenous voices on the environment are finally being heard as Marseille hosts a global biodiversity summit, with a call to protect 80% of the Amazon, as well as a “counter conference” highlighting the conservation movement’s historic violation of people’s rights.For the first time in its seven-decade history, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is including indigenous peoples as full voting members in their own right, rather than under the NGO category. Dozens of indigenous meetings are happening at the summit – which occurs every four years – with representatives from 23 organisations. Continue reading...

Spending watchdog says home insulation drive was fatally rushed and missed chance to cut heating bills and create jobsA “botched” scheme to insulate England’s draughty homes collapsed after six months because officials rushed its design, put in place an undeliverable timetable, and failed to heed industry warnings, Whitehall’s spending watchdog has found.The National Audit Office (NAO) blamed the government for scuppering the opportunity to help households to improve the energy efficiency of their homes, reduce carbon emissions, and create tens of thousands of jobs by rushing the flagship scheme. Continue reading...

These sleek and slender birds have lost their bright spring plumage and will soon leave for sunnier climesIn spring, yellow wagtails (Motacilla flava) are so bright they look like flying lemons – or, as a birding buddy of mine memorably described them, “like an effing canary”.But now, at the start of autumn, the juvenile bird I’m watching is far less conspicuous. Olive-brown above, buffish-yellow below, he almost blends in with the muddy earth, churned up by the cattle among which it feeds. Continue reading...

Subsidiary of Empire Energy, which has close ties to the Liberal party, would be given $21m under drilling programThe federal minister for resources and water, Keith Pitt, will press ahead on plans to open up the Beetaloo Basin in the Northern Territory to fracking by giving taxpayer money to oil and gas companies despite a legal challenge to the government’s program.Under the proposed Beetaloo Cooperative Drilling Program, Imperial Oil and Gas – a wholly owned subsidiary of Empire Energy that has close ties to the Liberal party – would be given $21m. Continue reading...

Environmental activists demand delay to Glasgow climate talks if costs and travel restrictions block attendance of those worst-hitThe Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow should be postponed until the government can ensure that the talks won’t be a “rich nations stitch-up”, a diverse coalition of international organisations has said.With less than two months to go before the talks, the Climate Action Network (CAN), a global alliance of more than 1,500 civil society organisations, is warning that many delegates from the global south will be unable to attend due to vaccine inequity and prohibitive quarantine costs. Continue reading...

Opponents say document contradicts company’s claim it will principally supply industries closer to homeThe coal extracted from the planned Cumbrian mine may go further overseas, rather than be used in Britain and the EU as the company has claimed, the public inquiry into the scheme heard on its opening day.West Cumbria Mining’s (WCM) proposals to extract 2.7m tonnes of metallurgical coal a year from a site off the Cumbrian coast at St Bees are being examined by the Planning Inspectorate.

Exclusive: At least nine mines have received special permission from regulators allowing them to avoid penalties

First minister unveils legislative programme including referendum and policies agreed with GreensNicola Sturgeon has told civil servants to start making a new case for independence, which offers people “an informed choice on Scotland’s future” in the Scottish government’s first legislative programme since last month’s cooperation deal with the Scottish Greens.Bills to set up a national care service and reform the Gender Recognition Act, as well as proposals for private sector rent controls by the end of this year, all featured in Sturgeon’s plan for the year to come in Holyrood. Continue reading...

Award comes during booming year for nature books, with sales over the last two months reaching £2.8mJames Rebanks’s story of his family’s farm in the Cumbrian Fells, English Pastoral, has won the Wainwright nature writing prize, praised as a “seminal work which will still be celebrated in 50 years”.The follow-up to Rebanks’s memoir The Shepherd’s Life, English Pastoral tells of the home in the Lake District, where his family have lived and worked for more than 600 years, and how he began to farm in a more sustainable way. It was up against titles including Raynor Winn’s follow-up to The Salt Path, The Wild Silence, for the award, which is named after writer and fellwalker Alfred Wainwright and which goes to the book that “most successfully inspires readers to explore the outdoors and to nurture a respect for the natural world”. Continue reading...

Study finds 40% of resident and regular migrant dragonflies and damselflies have increased in number since 1970Six new species of dragonfly have colonised Britain in the last 25 years as dragonflies and damselflies boom in a warming climate.More than 40% of resident and regular migrant dragonflies and damselflies have increased in number since 1970 with just 11% declining, according to a study of 1.4m dragonfly records. Continue reading...

Study finds agriculture and pesticide use threaten relatives of world’s most important crops, considered crucial to food security

Archbishop of Canterbury, pope and leader of Orthodox church ask for people’s prayers ahead of Cop26Global Christian leaders have joined forces to warn that the world is facing a critical moment as the climate crisis threatens the future of the planet.In an unprecedented joint declaration, Pope Francis, the leader of the Roman Catholic church, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of the Orthodox church, and the archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, who is the leader of the global Anglican communion, call on the world population – “whatever their beliefs or worldview” – to “listen to the cry of the Earth and of people who are poor”. Continue reading...

Event heralded as ‘a great contribution to conservation of threatened, high-profile species’A pair of squawking, thrashing, bald and violently pink twins arrived in the world in Madrid on Sunday, much to the relief of their mother and all those working to ensure the giant panda population continues to claw its way back from the brink.Madrid’s Zoo Aquarium announced the birth of the as-yet-unnamed cubs on Monday, describing their arrival as “a great contribution to the field of conservation of a threatened and high-profile species that is an icon among those who love and protect nature”. Continue reading...

Livestock companies with large emissions receive billions of dollars in funding, campaigners sayTwenty livestock companies are responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than either Germany, Britain or France – and are receiving billions of dollars in financial backing to do so, according to a new report by environmental campaigners.Raising livestock contributes significantly to carbon emissions, with animal agriculture accounting for 14.5% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. Scientific reports have found that rich countries need huge reductions in meat and dairy consumption to tackle the climate emergency. Continue reading...

Coal power has been the foundation for much of what Europe is today. But what has been the cost? Since 2016, half of the continent’s coal plants have closed, or are scheduled to close, as markets shift and the race to save the climate gathers speed. NGOs and grassroots organisations are working with communities to ensure the transition from coal is rapid, focused on renewables, and, most importantly, fair.This increased attention on the people who have long lived with coal has revealed unsteadiness, illness and deep seams of injustice in communities across the continent. The photographer Dan Wilton joined the environmental law charity ClientEarth to investigate and document Europe’s journey beyond coal

Campaigners say support for building UK’s first deep coalmine in 30 years is diminishingThere is dwindling support for proposals to build the UK’s first deep coalmine in 30 years in Cumbria, say campaigners, as a public inquiry into the mining plans gets under way.The plans attracted opposition earlier this year and were cited as an example of a lack of joined-up thinking from a UK government that was simultaneously making big promises on the environment. They were seen as particularly problematic in the run-up to the crucial Cop26 climate change summit due to be hosted in Glasgow this November. Chris Stark, the chief executive of the Climate Change Committee, pointed out that the mine would “increase global emissions and make it harder to achieve the UK carbon budgets”. Continue reading...

Air pollution kills more than malaria, HIV/Aids and TB combined but receives only 1% of development aidGovernments around the world gave 20% more in overseas aid funding to fossil fuel projects in 2019 and 2020 than to programmes to cut the air pollution they cause.Dirty air is the world’s biggest environmental killer, responsible for at least 4m early deaths a year. But just 1% of global development aid is used to tackle this crisis, according to an analysis from the Clean Air Fund (CAF). Continue reading...

Minister Matt Kean also announces 221 further sites to join Wollemi pines as assets of intergenerational significance

Number of species of sharks, rays and chimaeras facing ‘global extinction crisis’ doubles in a decadeA third of shark and ray species have been overfished to near extinction, according to an eight-year scientific study.“Sharks and rays are the canary in the coalmine of overfishing. If I tell you that three-quarters of tropical and subtropical coastal species are threatened, just imagine a David Attenborough series with 75% of its predators gone. If sharks are declining, there’s a serious problem with fishing,” said the paper’s lead author, Prof Nicholas Dulvy, of Canada’s Simon Fraser University. Continue reading...

Measures at Holme-next-the-Sea, Norfolk, hailed a success after strong breading season and return of floraElectric fences to protect nesting birds from people walking their dogs have been hailed a success, as popular beaches work to reduce damage from trampling.The beach at Holme-next-the-Sea in north Norfolk has breathtaking views, making it incredibly popular with visitors and dog-walkers. Continue reading...

The SA plan comes as manufacturers issue warning over ‘fractured’ Australian EV policy and call for states to scrap stamp duty on new vehicles

ShareAction says lack of plans to tackle climate crisis and biodiversity loss casts doubts on banking’s sustainability pledgesEurope’s 25 largest banks are still failing to present comprehensive plans that address both the climate crisis and biodiversity loss, putting their sustainability pledges in doubt, campaigners have warned.While some lenders such as NatWest are demonstrating leadership on specific issues – such as net zero targets and policies restricting financing for new fossil fuel – research by investment campaign group ShareAction found none of the banks it reviewed were taking action across all key areas. Continue reading...

The figure for the three months to September was 1.3C above the long-term average and higher than the previous record set in 2020New Zealand has recorded its warmest ever winter, and scientists say that climate change is driving temperatures ever higher.For the three months through to the end of August 2021, the average temperature was 9.8C, according to New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research. Continue reading...

Covid, climate breakdown, poverty and war threaten return to school after pandemic kept 1.5bn children out of classes

There could be choppy waters ahead for the PM, as potential rebels line up over social care, net zero and planningBoris Johnson has a significant inbox of spending, parliamentary rows and a likely reshuffle coming this autumn. As parliament returns and Whitehall prepares to take a tentative step towards “politics as usual”, we take a look at the biggest coming clashes of the session. Continue reading...

Coast Guard says potential slicks spotted in Gulf of Mexico after the powerful storm wreaked havoc in the region last weekDivers searching for the source of an oil spill spotted in the Gulf of Mexico in the wake of Hurricane Ida have identified a broken pipeline on the ocean floor as the possible cause.Talos Energy, the Houston-based company currently paying for the cleanup, said in a statement issued on Sunday evening that the broken pipeline, which is around 30cm (1ft) in diameter, did not belong to them. Continue reading...

Hundreds of dozing seals show how much cleaner the river is since it was declared dead in the 1950s“This is a sushi conveyor belt,” says the boat’s skipper, Stuart Barnes, as we watch the customers, dozens of harbour seals slumbering on sandbanks at the mouth of the Thames estuary, a 15-minute ride from Ramsgate marina.August is moulting season, when seals shed their coats and grow new ones, spending much of their day on the sandbanks as a result. This makes it a good time for scientists to count them, with the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) running its three-day annual seal survey, using boats and a specially chartered light aircraft to get a view from above. Continue reading...