Severe weather brought heavy rain and strong winds and flooded hundreds of propertiesFlooding and damage left in the wake of Storm Dennis, which swept across the UK on 15 and 16 February, is estimated to cost £225m in insurance claims, taking the total insurance costs from two February storms to £425m.The severe weather brought heavy rain and strong winds to England and Wales, which led to record high river levels and flooded hundreds of properties. Continue reading...

Ministers were planning to ban environmentally harmful practice of burning old heatherOwners of large grouse moors threatened to take legal action against government ministers who had started developing plans to ban repeated heather burning, Whitehall documents have disclosed.The landowners issued the threat after ministers started working on producing a law to ban them from carrying out the environmentally damaging practice on their moorland estates. The old heather is burned to expose new shoots – a source of food for grouse, whose numbers are boosted. The estates then charge people who want to shoot grouse. Continue reading...

Financial Reporting Council wants to ensure companies are being clear with investorsThe UK’s accounting watchdog has launched a major review into whether companies and their auditors are adequately reflecting the financial risks of the climate crisis in their accounts.The Financial Reporting Council, which sets reporting standards for all listed companies in the UK, plans to use the review to make sure companies are being clear with investors about their exposure to climate risks. Continue reading...

As villagers in Somali region fall ill in unexplained circumstances, some locals fear gas exploration has tainted the local water supplyAt first, 23-year-old Khadar Abdi Abdullahi’s eyes began turning yellow. Then the palms of his hands did the same. Soon he was bleeding from his nose, and from his mouth, and his body was swelling all over. Eventually he collapsed with fever. He later died.A deadly sickness is spreading through villages near a Chinese natural gas project in Ethiopia’s Somali region, according to locals and officials who spoke to the Guardian. Many of Khadar’s neighbours have suffered the same symptoms. Like him, some died. Continue reading...

If ocean temperatures don’t drop in the next two weeks, heat stress could tip reef over into another widespread eventThe Great Barrier Reef could be heading for a third major coral bleaching outbreak in the space of five years if high ocean temperatures in the region do not drop in the next two weeks, scientists and conservationists have warned.Heat stress is already building across the world’s biggest reef system, with reports of patchy bleaching already occurring. But a major widespread event is not currently taking place. Continue reading...

Use of harmful chemicals is higher in poorer nations, according to data analysed by UnearthedThe world’s biggest pesticide companies make billions of dollars a year from chemicals found by independent authorities to pose high hazards to human health or the environment, according to an analysis by campaigners.The research also found a higher proportion of these highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs) in the companies’ sales in poorer nations than in rich ones. In India, 59% of sales were of HHPs in contrast to just 11% in the UK, according to the analysis. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Anthony Albanese is expected to confirm in speech on Friday that Labor will oppose using Kyoto carryover creditsLabor has locked in behind a target of net zero emissions by 2050, and will oppose taxpayer funding of new coal-fired power plants, in the party’s first major decisions about climate policy for the next federal election.As well as adopting the clear 2050 target that Scott Morrison appears reluctant to sign up to, in part because of rolling combat within the Coalition, Guardian Australia understands shadow cabinet has also decided to oppose using carryover credits from the Kyoto period to meet future emissions reduction targets. Continue reading...

NSW government says relocation the priority but will not rule out some brumbies may be killed during largest removal of horses in park’s history

Deputy premier John Barilaro says the government’s priority is ‘getting new trees in the ground and strengthening the industry’The New South Wales government won’t proceed with privatising Forestry Corporation’s softwood plantation business after an unprecedented bushfire season.The government decided to forgo a long-term lease of the business after a five-month investigation which took into account recent damage to the state’s forestry assets. Continue reading...

Group of about 20 blocked Canadian National Railway Co rail line near Edmonton, capital of the western province of AlbertaDemonstrators opposed to a Canadian gas pipelinehave blockaded another railway line in the west of the country, adding to pressure on Justin Trudeau to solve a two-week protest.Freight traffic in eastern Canada has already been stopped for days after campaigners blockaded a main line in Ontario. Protesters across the country have taken up the cause of the Wet’suwet’en indigenous people who are seeking to stop the C$6.6bn (US$4.98bn) Coastal GasLink gas pipeline project in British Columbia. Continue reading...

Number of properties built in high-risk areas has more than doubled in recent yearsOne in 10 of all new homes in England since 2013 have been built on land at the highest risk of flooding, official figures reveal, potentially leaving tens of thousands of people in greater danger from extreme winter storms.The number of properties built in these high-risk areas annually has more than doubled in recent years, with more than 84,000 new at-risk homes in total since 2013, according to a Guardian analysis of government data. Continue reading...

Study indicates human fossil methane emissions have been underestimated by up to 40%The oil and gas industry has had a far worse impact on the climate than previously believed, according to a study indicating that human emissions of fossil methane have been underestimated by up to 40%.Although the research will add to pressure on fossil fuel companies, scientists said there was cause for hope because it showed a big extra benefit could come from tighter regulation of the industry and a faster shift towards renewable energy. Continue reading...

Environmentalists and politicians at loggerheads after court order halts tree fellingGerman environmentalists and political leaders are at loggerheads over plans to build a Tesla electric car factory on the site of woodland outside Berlin, with the government casting doubt over the future of a project seen as key for its support of green technologies and regeneration in the east of the country.The economy minister, Peter Altmaier, said this week that delays could threaten the go-ahead of the so-called Gigafactory, which is expected to employ up to 12,000 workers making 50,000 electric cars a year. Continue reading...

Discovery draws criticism from those who say fashion industry generates too much wasteHundreds of Victoria’s Secret bras have reportedly been found discarded in a bin close to a recently closed branch of the lingerie store in Colorado.The discovery comes at a time when the fashion industry is under fire for generating significant levels of waste, while Victoria’s Secret continues to face criticism regarding recent controversies. Continue reading...

Utah aims to reduce emissions over air quality concerns as other red states are also starting to tackle global heatingIn a move to protect its ski slopes and growing economy, Utah – one of the reddest states in the nation – has just created a long-term plan to address the climate crisis.Related: Washington state takes bold step to restrict companies from bottling local water Continue reading...

The billionaire couple want to provide ready-made solar and battery arrays to communities cut off from the power gridSoftware billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes and his wife Annie have promised up to $12m to install solar and battery systems in communities disconnected from the electricity grid by bushfire or flood.The couple say they will provide prefabricated solar panel and battery systems through a new venture, known as Resilient Energy Collective, that will power up to 100 sites disconnected from the grid in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. Some are relying on diesel generators, others are without power. Continue reading...

The ALP leader says a feasibility study into a new coal-fired power station in Queensland is ‘hush money’ for climate scepticsAnthony Albanese says he supports jobs and economic activity from the Adani coalmine, but he has blasted a feasibility study into a new coal-fired power plant in Collinsville as “hush money” for climate sceptics in the Coalition.In Queensland on Wednesday for his fourth “vision statement” since taking the Labor leadership, Albanese told reporters the ALP needed to improve its electoral performance in the state given the poor showing in last year’s federal election. He said he was listening to voters in a number of regional centres. Continue reading...

Rivers Severn, Teme and Wye will remain high as rain builds up again from Wednesday morningFlood-hit UK communities are braced for further heavy rain as river levels continue to threaten to breach barriers.Hundreds of properties have been flooded and at-risk areas evacuated across England and Wales after the downpours brought by Storm Dennis. Continue reading...

For all the talk of retraining Polish miners, this fund will most likely line the pockets of the carbon finance elites

Children in biggest carbon-emitting nations are healthiest, while those with tiny environmental footprints suffer twofold from poor health and living at the sharp end of the climate crisisEvery country in the world is failing to shield children’s health and their futures from intensifying ecological degradation, climate change and exploitative marketing practices, says a new report.The report says that despite dramatic improvements in survival, nutrition, and education over the past 20 years, “today’s children face an uncertain future”, with every child facing “existential threats”. Continue reading...

State senate passes bill to ban new permits for water bottling operations, calling process ‘detrimental to public welfare’Washington has taken a major step toward becoming the first US state to restrict companies looking to extract, bottle and sell local water supplies.On Monday night the state senate passed a bill that would ban new permits for water bottling operations. SB 6278 states “any use of water for the commercial production of bottled water is deemed to be detrimental to the public welfare and the public interest” and would apply retroactively to new permits filed after 1 January 2019. Continue reading...

Miner will not set climate targets, but will produce less coal as reserves are depletedMining giant Glencore has predicted its carbon footprint will shrink by almost a third by 2035, but will not set climate targets for the company.The company expects its total carbon emissions to fall by 30% in the next 15 years as it gradually produces less coal due to the “natural depletion” of its coal reserves. Continue reading...

Many facilities lack the ability to process ‘mixed plastics’, a category of waste that has virtually no market as new productsMany plastic items that Americans put in their recycling bins aren’t being recycled at all, according to a major new survey of hundreds of recycling facilities across the US.The research, conducted by Greenpeace and released on Tuesday, found that out of 367 recycling recovery facilities surveyed none could process coffee pods, fewer than 15% accepted plastic clamshells – such as those used to package fruit, salad or baked goods – and only a tiny percentage took plates, cups, bags and trays. Continue reading...

Scientists propose best use of funds pledged by Amazon founder to fight climate crisisAmazon revenue to restore the Amazon rainforest? A political war chest in the US to counter the pernicious influence of big oil? Or research funding for “moonshot” technologies to suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere?The world’s richest man is never going to be short of suggestions for how to spend money, but Jeff Bezos’s announcement of a new $10bn (£7.67bn) Earth Fund to fight global heating has raised the question of what is the best bang for a climate buck. Continue reading...

P&O Maritime employee Madeleine Habib was asked to remove social media post of a banner on the ship after the Australian Antarctic Division contacted P&OAn officer on Australia’s flagship Antarctic icebreaker, the Aurora Australis, was asked by bosses to remove a social media post showing her on deck with a banner critical of Scott Morrison’s climate policies after Australia’s Antarctic Division contacted her employer.Madeleine Habib, currently in Antarctica, unfurled the banner with the words “Scomo – Coal or Ice?” and posted the picture on her Facebook page. Continue reading...

Pollination has become big business, and thieves are now targeting hives with growing sophistication in the USMike Potts was aware he was at risk of being a victim of crime, he just didn’t think it would happen to him. But Potts is an owner of an increasingly valuable commodity that thieves are targeting with growing sophistication in the US: bees.A booming demand for honeybees for pollination drew Potts, owner of Pottsy’s Pollination in Oregon, to load 400 hives of his bees on trucks and drive them down to California’s agricultural heartland last month. He unloaded them to a holding area just outside Yuba City and returned just a few days later to find 92 hives had been whisked away by thieves. Continue reading...

Experiment revealed increased wind speeds reduced the efficiency of their foraging

Water is being trucked to several NSW south coast towns and a mobile treatment plant is filtering water at the Brogo damTowns in the bushfire-ravaged Bega Valley are relying on water carted in milk tanks after flooding made the catchment’s water supply undrinkable.Bega Valley shire council has been trucking bore water from Bega for towns such as Bermagui, Cobargo and Quaama and the Australian Defence Force has set up a mobile water treatment plant to filter the water supply at the Brogo dam. Continue reading...

Solar panels, heat pumps and sustainable designs bypassed – but now one Somerset school is taking a standIt is a modernist version of a log cabin nestling in a busy south London suburb – and it is about to make history. The new building for Hackbridge primary, in Sutton, opens next week as England’s first zero-carbon school, able to produce and conserve as much energy as it uses, and even put unused electricity generated back into the grid.With its wood frame and cladding, solar panels, pumps to collect heat from the ground, and insulation made from recycled newspaper, it is the first school in England to meet the ambitious Passivhaus Plus low-energy design standard. Continue reading...

As governments prepare to negotiate a Paris-style UN agreement on nature, 23 former foreign ministers have issued a call for urgent actionHumanity’s ongoing destruction of nature threatens the survival of our species, a group of former foreign ministers has warned, calling on leaders to step back from “the precipice” of irreversible ecological ruin and protect the planet.The planet’s rapidly warming oceans must be the focus of increased conservation efforts due to their importance in producing oxygen and food for billions of people, the former ministers added, as governments prepare to begin negotiations for a Paris-style UN agreement on nature next week. Continue reading...

Northland residents describe ‘heartbreaking’ find as experts warn climate crisis could make it a more frequent sightHundreds of thousands of mussels have been cooked to death on a beach in New Zealand’s North Island, with experts saying more will die as the effects of the climate crisis accelerate.The mass die-off in Northland was sparked by “an exceptional period of warm weather” combined with low tides in the middle of the day, which had exposed the shellfish, said Dr Andrew Jeffs, a marine scientist from the University of Auckland. Continue reading...

Government pledges to spend £20m turning canals, mines and rail lines into heat sourcesThe canals of the West Midlands may seem an unlikely source of warmth, but these waterways could soon be used to heat hospitals and tower blocks under a plan to harness Britain’s hidden heating sources.The government has promised to spend more than £20m on nine schemes across the country to exploit cheap, renewable heat from canals, old mineshafts and in London tube lines. Continue reading...

Drop from level 2 to level 1 restrictions announced after the ‘biggest rain event in 20 years’

Discovery of reptiles comes days after 13 royal pythons were found in same locationA second nest of 16 snakes has been found dumped outside a fire station, days after 13 royal pythons were found in the same spot.Related: Scottish animal welfare baffled by python mutilation in Aberdeen Continue reading...

Survey shows ‘significant and substantial’ decline in the popularity of Scott Morrison and the CoalitionAustralia’s bushfire crisis has caused a spike in concern about the environment, a hit to the popularity of the Coalition and Scott Morrison and a drop in support for new coalmines, even among Coalition voters.Those are the conclusions of a poll of 3,249 Australians conducted by the Australian National University’s Centre for Social Research and Methods, which found a “significant and substantial decline” in the Coalition’s vote from 40% in October 2019 to 35% in January. Continue reading...

Engineers at the University of Queensland say technology could be used to power small devices, such as a phone, within two yearsA flexible solar “skin” that could be used to generate power on homes, cars and phones is a step closer to development after the technology was used to break a world record for electricity conversion, researchers say.Engineers at the University of Queensland have been working with nanoparticles known as quantum dots that pass electrons and generate an electrical current when exposed to solar energy. Continue reading...

Action at Trinity part of week-long protests over ties between colleges and fossil fuel industryExtinction Rebellion protesters have dug up the lawn of Trinity College, Cambridge, as part of a week-long series of demonstrations.The climate activists dug channels into the turf in front of the college’s 16th-century great gate with shovels and pitchforks and planted Extinction Rebellion flags. Continue reading...

Spill is enough to fill 320 Olympic-sized pools and fouled Tarpon River, Himmarshee Canal and streets in three neighborhoodsFort Lauderdale officials say 211.6m gallons of sewage has spilled into Fort Lauderdale waterways in the past few months.The Sun-Sentinel reports that’s enough to fill 320 Olympic-sized pools. Continue reading...

Every February Horsetail Fall is lit by the setting sun, bringing thousands of people to Yosemite to watch the phenomenon

The backbencher calls for a roadmap to net zero as ‘an arms race’ in low emissions technology drives transformationThe Victorian Liberal Katie Allen has declared the world is approaching an “iPhone moment” when it comes to new technology lowering greenhouse gas emissions, and Australia needs to be part of the revolution, rather than being a technology “taker”.Allen has joined fellow Liberal Trent Zimmerman in noting the Coalition’s decision to sign the Paris agreement means Australia has already committed to achieving carbon neutrality by mid-century. But she said the government should not nominate a specific date to hit the milestone until it had developed a policy roadmap. Continue reading...

Explorer says halting imports would recognise the devastating impact of colonialism on wildlifeBanning the import and export of big game hunting trophies would recognise the destructive impact European powers have had on wildlife in former African and Asian colonies, Sir Ranulph Fiennes has said.Speaking to the Guardian, the veteran British explorer said hunting endangered species such as rhinos, elephants and lions to keep their body parts as trophies should be viewed with the same scepticism as Chinese traditional medicine in terms of the damage it does to biodiversity. Continue reading...

Use of ‘scrubbers’ to cut air pollution increases pollutants pumped into sea, UN report saysNew shipping pollution regulations introduced earlier this year could harm humans by contaminating fish and crustaceans with toxins, according to an internal report compiled by the International Maritime Organization and obtained by the Guardian.In the report the IMO, the United Nations agency responsible for regulating shipping, says that there is insufficient “toxicity data” to be able to assess the risk to humans caused by the increased use of exhaust gas cleaning systems, which are also known as “scrubbers”. Continue reading...

Mining giant allowed 13% increase in emissions in three years under Coalition policy that promised to limit increases in pollution from big industryMining giant BHP has repeatedly applied and been granted approval to increase its emissions under an Australian government policy that promised to limit carbon pollution from big industry.Government data shows BHP exceeded its initial emissions limits, set under the scheme known as the “safeguard mechanism”, at eight of its 14 large Australian industrial sites since 2016-17. Continue reading...

Downstream communities furious after northern Murray-Darling Basin irrigators told harvesting embargo to be lifted

Local council leaders said they were forced into ‘exceptional’ move to protect jobsA French ski resort has angered ecologists by using a helicopter to move snow from higher up the mountains after exceptionally mild weather left its slopes bare.Officials at Luchon-Superbagnères in the Pyrenees authorised the “exceptional” emergency operation overnight on Friday. Continue reading...

Enthusiasts say red tape and enforced fees would spoil popular Hampstead pondsEven in the bleak midwinter, a hardy few can be found bobbing around the dark waters of the Highgate bathing ponds on Hampstead Heath in north London, their faces wreathed in near-beatific smiles.As the late nature writer Roger Deakin enthused about wild swimming: “I can dive in with a long face, and what feels like a terminal case of depression, and come out a whistling idiot.” Continue reading...

As Dennis rages in a week after Ciara, flights are cancelled and trains are delayed amid warnings of widespread floodingStorm Dennis has wreaked havoc on Britain, forcing the cancellation of hundreds of flights and trains, and the deaths of at least two people yesterday.As the so-called bomb cyclone battered the coastline, as much as a month’s worth of rainfall was predicted overnight and into Sunday morning in some parts of the UK. Continue reading...

Wet weather expected to continue in parts of NSW, with showers and possible storms predictedSydney and New South Wales coastal residents are in for more wet weather with showers and possible storms predicted throughout the Sunday.The Bureau of Meteorology said central and southern NSW coastal areas would experience offshore winds, which caused havoc after ex-cyclone Uesi passed through to the south of the country. Continue reading...

The Liberal moderate says a 2050 target will bring Australia into line with its commitments under the Paris agreement• Australian politics live podcast with Trent Zimmerman: ‘I don’t think we should fund new coal-fired power plants’The Liberal MP Trent Zimmerman says the Morrison government should work towards adopting a target of net zero emissions by 2050 to bring itself into line with commitments Australia made under the Paris agreement, and to align Canberra’s policy with emissions reduction targets adopted by the states.In an interview with Guardian Australia’s politics podcast, Zimmerman said it was reasonable for the prime minister to want to do due diligence on what net zero would cost, and to consider what a policy roadmap would look like, “but this is something that we should be looking very seriously at”. Continue reading...