Environment | The Guardian

While oil and gas are not alone in struggling in the economic slump, the reality of the climate crisis is starting to bite, analysts sayThe global oil and gas industry has crashed. In mid-June, BP – formerly British Petroleum – slashed the value of its assets by US$17.5bn and revealed plans to cut its workforce by 15%. It forecast the price of oil would be a third lower than expected for decades to come and said it may be forced to leave new fossil fuel discoveries in the ground.It was later joined by Royal Dutch Shell, which announced its own US$22bn writedown, with its vast gas business – including major liquefied natural gas (LNG) developments in Australia – expected to take the heaviest toll. Continue reading...

Architect is ignoring his own environment pledge, say critics

Emergency crews responded to the incident near Grafton but were unable to save teenage boy’s lifeA shark attack on New South Wales’s north coast has claimed the life of a 15-year-old boy.Witnesses have told police a shark attacked the teenager while he was surfing at Wilsons Headland at Wooli Beach, near Grafton, just before 2.30pm. Continue reading...

The state energy ministers still need to deliver on their promises, but imagine if any of them held the federal portfolioSometimes it just takes a bit of leadership.Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull likes to say that we must choose “engineering and economics” over “idiocy and ideology”. The New South Wales energy minister, Matt Kean, has been making the right choices. Continue reading...

Labor calls for greater transparency into fundraising of foundation, which was awarded $443m by Coalition

The pick of the world’s best flora and fauna photos, including a ring-tailed lemur and a spiky sea cucumber Continue reading...

Tehran says incident in early hours in garrison town of Gamdareh was a power outageIran has denied reports that fresh mysterious explosions have rocked two towns close to Tehran, accusing the west of waging psychological warfare by spreading false messages on social media.Reports suggested that the blasts had occurred in the early hours of Friday in Gamdareh, a residential town that houses a number of military garrisons, including bases of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and in Shahr-e Qods. Officials insisted the reports were false but accepted there had been a power outage. Continue reading...

Designed in 1984 and expected to be in service a decade ago, the project is still incomplete

Last week the PM claimed conservation causes construction delays – but newts are not the pantomime villains developers would have us believeLingering in the shallows of a south Norfolk pond, voracious amphibians are resting ahead of a night gorging on slugs, worms and insects. The pool network, long grasses and shrubs in Silfield newt reserve are a perfect habitat for the great crested newt – the pantomime villain for housing developers.The UK’s largest newt, which takes its name from the striking, jagged crest that males display in the spring breeding season, is a protected species under British law, thanks to the the EU habitats directive, which the prime minister’s father, Stanley Johnson, had a key role in creating. Despite that, its numbers have declined rapidly over the past 60 years. Continue reading...

Exclusive: reduced congestion most likely reason for lower nitrogen dioxide, scientists say

Ruling, which includes most of Tulsa, casts doubt on hundreds of convictionsThe US supreme court has ruled that a large part of eastern Oklahoma remains a Native American reservation, a decision state and federal officials warn could throw the entire state into chaos.The court’s 5-4 decision, written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, means that Oklahoma prosecutors lack the authority to pursue criminal cases against Native American defendants in parts of Oklahoma that include most of Tulsa, the state’s second-largest city. Continue reading...

Inchconnachan is up for sale for offers over £500k, but its buyer must share it with a colony of marsupialsIt is a rare opportunity; the chance to buy a heavily wooded uninhabited island on Loch Lomond, only a short row from the shore. Rarer still, this island comes with a mob of feral wallabies.The island of Inchconnachan, a 42-hectare property held by the Colquhoun family for more than seven centuries, is for sale for offers over £500,000, complete with a ruined 1920s cottage and outhouses, secluded bays and gravel shores lapped by the loch’s gentle waves. Continue reading...

But demand for ivory and rhino horn shows signs of falling, says UN wildlife crime reportLion, jaguar and leopard body parts are being increasingly sought as substitutes to tiger products by traffickers, a major UN report has found, but demand for ivory and rhino horn has shown signs of a sustained fall.Wildlife trafficking continues to pose a major threat to nature, global biodiversity and human health, the UN’s Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has warned, following an analysis of trends in the multibillion dollar illegal wildlife trade. Continue reading...

You’re turning a perfectly good planet into a hellworld for money!

Release of a small herd of endangered animals in Kent is planned for spring 2022Wild bison are to return to the UK for the first time in 6,000 years, with the release of a small herd in Kent planned for spring 2022.The £1m project to reintroduce the animals will help secure the future of an endangered species. But they will also naturally regenerate a former pine wood plantation by killing off trees. This creates a healthy mix of woodland, scrub and glades, boosting insect, bird and plant life. Continue reading...

Water firms not addressing problem of leaks, causing loss of 3bn litres a day, report findsThere is a serious risk that parts of England will run out of water within 20 years, MPs have warned.The public accounts committee said the bodies responsible for water in the UK had “taken their eye off the ball” and the scale of leakage – more than 3bn litres a day – was “wholly unacceptable”. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Backlog of cases awaiting determination – including first one lodged under land rights act in 1984 – labelled a ‘betrayal’There are 37,000 unresolved Aboriginal land claims in New South Wales awaiting determination by the government, including the first claim lodged under the land rights act in 1984. The backlog has been described as “a national disgrace” and a form of institutional racism.According to research seen by Guardian Australia, the backlog has built over decades. Continue reading...

Class action aims to force city with one of country’s most expensive water rates to institute affordable payment planA coalition of civil rights groups have filed a landmark class action to permanently ban water shutoffs for Detroit residents and force the city to implement an affordable payment plan.Detroit, which has one of the most expensive water rates in the country, has disconnected more than 140,000 households since 2014, as part of an internationally condemned debt collection scheme which has left thousands of vulnerable residents without running water for months or years. Continue reading...

Trump’s energy secretary Dan Brouillette promotes ‘all fuels’ free-market strategy at climate and sustainability summitThe US has argued for less regulation of the world’s energy systems, speaking out against the policy interventions promoting clean energy that are central to a “green recovery” from the coronavirus crisis.Dan Brouillette, the US energy secretary, told a global summit of energy ministers, focused on sustainable recovery, that democracies should choose the free market over policies such as taxes, regulations and climate risk assessments on companies that would “steer people away from some energy sources and in the direction of others”. Continue reading...

Testing facility for zero-emissions four-passenger electric aircraft expected to be built in Narromine within the year

Environment minister Matt Kean says the push to build 8,000 megawatts of wind and solar is part of a plan to replace coal-fired powerThe New South Wales government aims to back renewable energy plants in the New England region with the capacity to power 3.5m homes, with the state’s environment minister saying enough will be built to replace most of the state’s coal-fired power stations earlier than scheduled.Matt Kean, the minister for energy and the environment, will on Friday announce a second renewable energy zone for the state, following a previously planned designated area in the state’s central west. Continue reading...

Fish and Wildlife Service had sought to strip safeguards, which would have allowed a limited number to obtain hunting licensesIn a stunning victory for wildlife conservationists and indigenous tribes – and for bears – a US court ruled on Wednesday that grizzly bears living in the vast Yellowstone ecosystem will remain federally protected and not be subjected to sport hunting.The US Fish and Wildlife Service had sought to strip Yellowstone-area grizzlies of safeguards conferred by the Endangered Species Act. This would have allowed the states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho to permit a limited number of people to obtain hunting licenses, though sport hunting would have remained prohibited within Yellowstone itself. Continue reading...

Update to IUCN red list warns of hamster’s falling birth rate and high demand for fungusHamsters and fungi may not be poster species among those threatened with extinction but are no less important in ecosystems, according to an updated list of the world’s most fragile species.The European hamster once scurried across much of Europe and Russia but has now vanished from most of its original range and on current trends will go extinct within 30 years, according to the update of the IUCN red list, the global database of species on the brink. Continue reading...

Conservationists hope first known camera-trap images of species are sign of resurgenceRare images of a group belonging to one of the most endangered gorilla subspecies in the world suggest their numbers could be recovering after decades of persecution, conservationists in Nigeria have said.Seven Cross River gorillas including infants of varying ages can be seen in the first known camera-trap images of the species, taken in the Mbe mountains in south-east Nigeria by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). Continue reading...

Pandemic prompted states to temporarily ban reusable grocery bags and stalled legislation aimed at reducing plastic packaging2020 was supposed to be the year America revolted against plastic.Consumers were refusing straws and toting their own coffee mugs. Legislators had proposed an unprecedented wave of laws to ban single-use plastics. Even companies like Coke and Pepsi were opening up to the idea plastic might not be the future. Continue reading...

Last time CO2 was at similar level temperatures were 3C to 4C hotter and sea levels were 20 metres higherThe amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere is approaching a level not seen in 15m years and perhaps never previously experienced by a hominoid, according to the authors of a study.At pre-lockdown rates of increase, within five years atmospheric CO2 will pass 427 parts per million, which was the probable peak of the mid-Pliocene warming period 3.3m years ago, when temperatures were 3C to 4C hotter and sea levels were 20 metres higher than today. Continue reading...

Companies claim that reducing returns to cut energy bills will have impact on investment

Australians are reporting bird sightings at record rates – it’s good for the spirit, and for scienceMany Victorians returning to stage-three lockdown will be looking for ways to pass the hours at home. And some will be turning to birdwatching.When Australians first went into lockdown in March, the combination of border closures, lockdowns and the closure of burnt areas from last summer’s bushfires meant those who would have travelled far and wide to watch their favourite birds, instead stayed home. Continue reading...

Experts believe endangered shore plovers – known for their pluck and friendliness – might have flown away or been eaten by predatorsA specialist search and recovery team has been deployed to recapture the last remaining survivors of a flock of endangered birds that absconded from a predator-free island in New Zealand during coronavirus lockdown.There are only 250 shore plover or tūturuatu left in the wild and they are the world’s rarest plover. Conservationists have been painstakingly reintroducing them to the mainland after they were almost wiped out by cats and rats by 1880. Continue reading...

Sector excluded in transport emissions figures but policy change unlikely until 2023International aviation and shipping emissions are likely to be included in the UK government’s net zero target, it has emerged – but not until after 2023.The intention to review carbon accounting emerged after ministers and advisers, including climate activists, held the first meeting of the Department for Transport’s net zero board. Continue reading...

Summer statement’s focus on energy efficiency welcomed but disappointment that no boost for renewables

It may be best near-term way to remove CO2, say scientists, but cutting fossil fuel use remains criticalSpreading rock dust on farmland could suck billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide from the air every year, according to the first detailed global analysis of the technique.The chemical reactions that degrade the rock particles lock the greenhouse gas into carbonates within months, and some scientists say this approach may be the best near-term way of removing CO from the atmosphere. Continue reading...

Scientists claim widespread conservation can bring rewards if right policies are followedNearly a third of the world’s oceans and land area could be placed under environmental protections without harming the global economy, and even produce bumper economic benefits if the right policies were followed, according to a global assessment.Ecosystems around the world are collapsing or hovering on the brink of disaster, with a million species threatened with extinction. But if at least 30% of the planet’s land and oceans were subject to conservation efforts, that mass extinction could be avoided and vital habitats restored, scientists estimate. Continue reading...

Scientists use a strategy called assisted migration in an attempt to rescue tree species from inhospitable conditions

When 323 reindeer were killed by lightning on a remote Norwegian plateau, their bodies were left for nature to take its courseIn August 2016, a park ranger stumbled upon 323 dead wild tundra reindeer in Norway’s remote Hardangervidda plateau. They had been killed in a freak lightning event. But instead of removing the carcasses, the park decided to leave them where they were, allowing nature to take its course – and scientists to study this island of decomposition and how it might change the arctic tundra ecosystem.Over the years scientists observed the bloated, fly-infested bodies turn into dry skeletons. The latest paper, published by the Royal Society in June, looked at the creation of a “landscape of fear”, as top predators such as wolverines, golden eagles and arctic foxes took advantage of the carrion. Continue reading...

Wildlife Trusts report also calls for expansion of projects such as flower-rich road verges and butterfly reintroductionsThe use of pesticides in the UK must be at least halved to reverse steep losses in insect abundance and boost the natural world that depends on them, according to a report.It warns that insects are the “canaries in the coal mine” of the natural world and that everyone, including the government, local authorities, community groups and individuals, needs to become insect champions. Continue reading...

Halting Huawei hurts 5G rollout and Sino-British ties, but stopping a Chinese nuclear power plant in Essex has virtually no falloutGet ready for the “new Huawei” is the word from Westminster, meaning another flare-up in UK-China business and political relations, this time over Chinese involvement in the UK’s nuclear power programme.Ditching state-owned China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN) would indeed be a political development on a political par with a Huawei exclusion. The 2016 agreement, which imagined CGN’s “progressive entry” into the UK’s “resurgent” nuclear ambitions, was given maximum hype at the time by both Beijing and David Cameron’s government. Continue reading...

Single classification system could end centuries of disagreement and improve global efforts to tackle biodiversity lossA plan to create the first universally recognised list of species on Earth has prompted hopes of an end to centuries of disagreement and confusion over how to classify the world’s library of life.The 10-point plan aims to finally bring order with an authoritative list of the world’s species and a governance mechanism responsible for its quality. Researchers hope a single recognised list would improve global efforts to tackle biodiversity loss, the trade in endangered wildlife, biosecurity and conservation. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Australia’s big four banks have loaned $7bn to 33 new or expansionary fossil fuel projects between 2016 and 2019, analysis findsSince the Paris agreement was signed, Australia’s big four banks have financed new fossil fuel projects that would cancel out the national emissions reduction target 21 times over, according to analysis by the activist investor group Market Forces.The analysis, released on Wednesday, shows the banks have loaned $7bn to 33 new or expansionary fossil fuel projects between 2016 and 2019. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Campaigners say £3bn scheme fails to comply with Paris accord and is just ‘a fig-leaf for polluters’Boris Johnson’s much-vaunted green recovery plans are inadequate and “clearly unlawful” as they do not match up to the government’s legal obligations under the Paris climate agreement and the UK’s own net zero emissions target, green campaigners have said.On Tuesday, a letter threatening court action was sent to the prime minister and the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, by the pressure group Plan B, which successfully took the government to the appeal court this year over its green light for the expansion of Heathrow airport. Continue reading...

Businesses include oil and gas drillers and coal mine operators, an analysis by Documented and the Guardian findsMore than 5,600 companies in the fossil fuel industry have taken a minimum of $3bn in coronavirus aid from the US federal government, according to an analysis by Documented and the Guardian of newly released data.The businesses include oil and gas drillers and coal mine operators, as well as refiners, pipeline companies and firms that provide services to the industry. Continue reading...

Proposed £3bn environmental funding for UK contrasts with Germany’s £36bn investmentEnvironmental groups have reacted with disappointment to details of the government’s Covid-19 economic rescue package released by the Treasury.On Monday night the government announced some details of the announcement expected on Wednesday, including a £1bn energy efficiency upgrade for public buildings and insulation for some social tenants, who could save up to £200 a year on their energy bills as a result. A Green Jobs Challenge fund will provide £40m for green charities working on improving England’s landscapes, with the money to be spent on projects such as tree-planting and cleaning up rivers. A further £50m will go to innovative approaches to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from social housing. Continue reading...

Accounts from Indonesian crew on illegal fishing operation reveal ‘inhumane’ conditions including bodies dumped at seaWhen Sepri and Ari boarded a Chinese tuna fishing vessel in February 2019, the 24-year-old best friends were excited at the prospect of working together and having adventures at sea. Lured by the promise of high wages after being jobless back in their village in Indonesia, they told their families they would bring home “a lot of money” and make them proud.Neither of them saw their families again. Both men died at sea after weeks of agony: working 18-hour days without adequate food or water and under the threat of violence, according to survivors who gave harrowing accounts of the deaths to the Guardian – including their bodies being thrown overboard. Continue reading...

Plans for new terminals may be abandoned because of glut of fossil fuel supply, says studyA multibillion-dollar pipeline of projects aiming to ship gas around the world on giant tankers could be in jeopardy because of a collapse in the global gas market, according to a report.A study by Global Energy Monitor has found that spending on new gas terminals needed to ship super-chilled liquified natural gas (LNG) on seaborne tankers has more than doubled in the past year, from $82.8bn (£66.3bn) to $196.1bn. Continue reading...

Campaigners say Rishi Sunak’s plan to decarbonise public buildings does not go far enoughRishi Sunak is to announce a £3bn package of green investment to decarbonise public buildings and cut emissions from Britain’s poorly insulated homes as part of the government’s Covid-19 economic recovery plan.The chancellor will seek to use Wednesday’s summer statement on the economy to fend off criticism that his proposals lack ambition by insisting that he can “kick start” an environment-friendly revival through the creation of thousands of green jobs in the construction industry. Continue reading...

Ongoing destruction of nature will result in stream of animal diseases jumping to humans, says report

Trailblazing system would help to stabilise the energy grid’s electrical frequencyA giant flywheel in north-east Scotland could soon help to prevent blackouts across Britain by mimicking the effect of a power station but without using fossil fuels.The trailblazing project near Keith in Moray, thought to cost about £25m, will not generate electricity or produce carbon emissions – but it could help keep the lights on by stabilising the energy grid’s electrical frequency. Continue reading...