Call the emissions reduction fund a ‘climate solutions’ fund if you like, but it doesn’t mean it isLet’s start with the good news. Scott Morrison is talking constructively about climate change because he is intelligent enough to understand that failing to do that renders the Coalition unelectable in parts of the country, and with parts of its own base.Compared with where we’ve been, a Liberal prime minister standing up at a podium, accepting the science of climate change and making the case for action, is progress. Continue reading...

Exclusive: miner Gold Fields to get $1m from Coalition fund for gas power plant for its Western Australian mineThe Morrison government’s emissions reduction fund – rebadged as a “climate solutions” policy and to be boosted with an extra $2bn – is being used to help one of the world’s biggest gold miners pay for a fossil fuel power plant the company concedes it would have built anyway.Fund opponents say it is the latest evidence that design flaws in the scheme are leading to taxpayers’ money being wasted on projects that are commercially viable even without public support. In some cases, the climate funding is going to new fossil fuel projects on the grounds that they are cleaner than the dirty projects they replace. Continue reading...

Evidence collected by Friends of the Earth allege estates have continued practice despite voluntary commitments to stopAn official watchdog is investigating five grouse-shooting estates for allegedly damaging the environment in a practice that they had pledged to stop.Natural England is looking into allegations that the estates have repeatedly burned heather on their land to maximise the number of grouse for shooting. The watchdog launched its investigation after being passed evidence in the form of eyewitness accounts that the environmental group Friends of the Earth had collected. Continue reading...

PM to announce ‘climate solutions fund’ to appeal to voters concerned about Coalition’s recordScott Morrison will attempt to appeal to voters deeply concerned that the Coalition have been been wreckers on climate change by rebadging Tony Abbott’s emissions reduction fund as a “climate solutions” fund – with $2bn to be rolled out over 10 years.Attempting to draw a line over years of destructive in-fighting within the Coalition that has cruelled various emissions reduction policies, the prime minister will use a speech in Melbourne on Monday to launch a new package of measures on climate change, saying his government acknowledges and accepts the challenge “but we do so with cool heads, not just impassioned hearts”. Continue reading...

It is time to prove it is serious about phasing out use of fossil fuels worldwide

Former UN secretary-general says country must live up to Theresa May’s commitment

Britain’s carnivore numbers are booming after clampdown on hunting and pollutionThey must survive government culls, gamekeepers, poisoning, persecution and increasingly busy roads but, in modern times at least, Britain’s carnivores have never had it so good: badger, otter, pine marten, polecat, stoat and weasel populations have “markedly improved” since the 1960s, according to a new study.The otter, polecat and pine marten have bounced back from the brink of extinction, and the country’s only carnivorous mammal now in danger of being wiped out is the wildcat, with the dwindling Scottish populations hit by hybridisation with domestic and feral cats. Continue reading...

Simon Birmingham says coal taking twice as long as normal to clear ports amid quality checksAustralia’s trade minister has welcomed high-level confirmation from Beijing that there is no ban on coal exports, but has raised concern about slow processing times through some of China’s ports.Simon Birmingham told Sky News on Sunday coal was currently taking twice as long as normal to clear ports in China, and he referenced a similar set of circumstances that impacted Australian coal shipments last year. Continue reading...

Shadow environment minister sceptical whether law followed on approvals for coal projectTony Burke says he has always been sceptical about whether the law has been followed in relation to previous environmental approvals for the controversial Adani coal project in Queensland.But the shadow environment minister argues that he can’t telegraph a firm disposition about what he might do about the approvals in the future without making a prejudgment that could render any subsequent decision unlawful. Continue reading...

Two significant events have showed that a major adjustment of our economy is needed to end our reliance on coal

Glaswegian men are going topless and Aberdeen is positively balmy. What is going on with the weather?In Scotland, good weather is rarely unconditional. Take the honey bees, for instance. You’d think the wee fellas would be delighted with all this unseasonably good weather, but you’d be wrong. In Edinburgh on Saturday, Michelle Wood, who sells organic vegetables from her stall in the farmers market below the castle, was delivering a lesson in bee welfare. “People are tempted to cut their lawns too early when the weather is as mild as this in February,” she said. “That means the daisies and dandelions, which are a vital source of food for the honey bees, get cut, too, thus endangering the hive. I’m starting a campaign to raise awareness of this.”In Princes Street Gardens and up by the National Monument on Calton Hill, little clutches of daffodils were gathering, soon to announce their riotous presence. At the head gardener’s house at the east end of the Gardens, purples, pinks and yellows were already emerging. It is hard to believe that in this week last year all these places, along with just about everywhere else in Scotland, were impassable amid massive snowdrifts. The country’s first ever red warning for snow was issued as the “Beast from the East” occupied most of the UK and held it fast for two weeks. Continue reading...

Climate change and conflict have left the river Jordan a stagnant stream and the Sea of Galilee critically lowIf Jesus were alive today, he might reconsider a baptism in the river Jordan; there’s a good chance he’d pick up an eye infection. Faecal bacteria in the pungent, murky waters have risen in recent years to up to six times the recommended levels.Once a raging torrent, the lower Jordan has been starved of water to become a stagnant stream, filled with sewage and dirty run-off from farms. Around 95% of its historical flow has been diverted by agriculture during the past half-century. And the river’s primary source, the Sea of Galilee – where Christians believe the son of God walked on water – has for years been dammed to prevent its demise. Continue reading...

Sunrise Movement says California senator reacted with ‘smugness and disrespect’ to their campaigning for New Green DealThe California senator Dianne Feinstein is facing criticism over a video of her response to a group of children and teenagers asking her to support the Green New Deal.The video clip shows parts of a Friday morning meeting between the Democrat and young activists from the Sunrise Movement. Founded in 2017, the group organizes young people to fight climate change and support the Green New Deal. Continue reading...

Former vice-president continues environmental justice tour in Alabama and urges political leaders to take drastic actionAl Gore continued an environmental justice tour with a visit to poor areas of Alabama – and warned that already dire conditions are set to worsen because of climate change.Related: Hoda Muthana's father sues in bid to bring his daughter back to US Continue reading...

Traffic blocked at Department for Education during call for national curriculum changesMore than 100 teachers, academics and students have blocked traffic and staged mock climate classes outside the Department for Education in a protest against the underplaying of environmental problems in the national curriculum.The demonstrators – who carried Teach the Truth, Rebel for Life and Climate: More Important Than Brexit banners – urged the government to make the climate and ecological crisis an educational priority. Continue reading...

Pangolins, a mountain lion and a sad good-bye to Papua New Guinea’s Bramble Cay melomys Continue reading...

Redesignation makes Indiana Dunes the US’s newest national park, ending a fight for recognition lasting 103 yearsWild and rugged – though the link to Spielberg’s similarly-named action hero ends there – Indiana Dunes has been designated America’s newest national park, marking the end of a 103-year-long effort instigated by the US National Park Service’s first director Stephen Mather.The first national park in the state of Indiana, the area is already popular with tourists and day trippers from Chicago, with more than two million visitors a year exploring the 50 miles of walking trails through one of the country’s most biodiverse protected areas. Covering 15 miles of Lake Michigan shoreline, its vast sand dunes, forests, marshes and prairies are home to over 350 species of bird and 1,100 native plants. Continue reading...

A cold, wet March could prove problematic for animals now out of hibernation

Informed students are prompting adults to act on the issueI draw three circles on the board as my class watches.“So, what might this gas be?” Continue reading...

In part two of our series, indigenous Siona people claim their health is being affected by apparent contamination of riverMaría Isaura Cuaran, an indigenous Siona woman, is displaying a rash that has appeared at the base of her neck. It is barely visible, but there nonetheless. Pulling her turquoise top off her left shoulder and tugging down on her bead necklace, Cuaran talks about “the company” and how, she alleges, it has affected the local river.“Stomach problems, coughing, fever, vomiting, diarrhoea, welts, little spots, little blotches, general malaise …” Continue reading...

National cycle crime strategy set to launch after survey finds 50% of victims feel police don’t take the offence seriouslyFor many people a bicycle is the only transport they can afford and the only exercise they get. These people are often among society’s most vulnerable, and the impact of the loss of their bike can be devastating. So why is cycle theft so often seen as a minor crime?According to the police, 96,210 bikes were stolen in 2018, and about one in 50 bicycle-owning households are victims of cycle theft each year, but it’s a crime disproportionately visited on the young and the poor. Continue reading...

Plants, insects and organisms crucial to food production in steep decline, says UNThe world’s capacity to produce food is being undermined by humanity’s failure to protect biodiversity, according to the first UN study of the plants, animals and micro-organisms that help to put meals on our plates.The stark warning was issued by the Food and Agriculture Organisation after scientists found evidence the natural support systems that underpin the human diet are deteriorating around the world as farms, cities and factories gobble up land and pump out chemicals. Continue reading...

Park safety director alleges buckets of uranium sat near exhibit for almost 20 years, but interior department says there’s no riskFor almost 20 years, workers and visiting schoolchildren at a Grand Canyon museum may have been unknowingly exposed to radiation from three buckets of uranium sitting next to a taxidermy exhibit, according to allegations from a National Park Service safety director.The whistleblower says officials learned about the buckets last year and tried to hide the revelation, according to the Arizona Republic newspaper. This month, Elston “Swede” Stephenson emailed all park staff and brought the matter to the attention of the head of the interior department, which oversees the park service, and the agency’s internal watchdog. Continue reading...

Centrica says it will take £300m hit on cap on energy bills and lowers 2019 cashflow outlookThe owner of British Gas, Centrica, lost about three-quarters of a million customers last year and warned it will take a £300m hit from the government’s price cap on energy bills.Shares in Britain’s biggest energy company dropped more than 10% after the company lowered its cashflow outlook for 2019, leading investors to fear Centrica’s dividend could be cut. Continue reading...

Report says few headlines sparked by food crises that ravaged Madagascar, Ethiopia and HaitiClimate change was responsible for the majority of under-reported humanitarian disasters last year, according to analysis of more than a million online news stories.Whole populations were affected by food crises in countries ravaged by by drought and hurricanes such as Ethiopia and Haiti, yet neither crisis generated more than 1,000 global news stories each. Continue reading...

Adult female discovered 113 years after only other living Chelonoidis phantasticus was foundA living member of species of tortoise not seen in more than 110 years and feared to be extinct has been found in a remote part of the Galápagos island of Fernandina.Related: Welcome home, Lonesome George: giant tortoise returns to Galapagos Continue reading...

On Friday demonstrators will protest against ‘negligent’ climate change educationTeachers will follow on the heels of striking students on Friday with a protest to demand the national curriculum be reformed to make the climate and ecological crisis an educational priority.The Extinction Rebellion group will support the demonstration outside the Department for Education, which organisers describe as a “peaceful nonviolent protest that may involve civil disobedience”. Continue reading...

Australia’s largest coal producer says decision to cap production doesn’t mean it intends to drop greenfield coal projectsGreen groups say Australia’s biggest coal producer Glencore should commit to withdrawing from new coalmining projects if it is serious about aligning its business with the goals of the Paris agreement.The company has moved to cap its output of thermal and coking coal at current production levels of 145m tonnes a year after pressure from investors who want companies to take stronger action and factor in the financial risks of climate change. Continue reading...

The baby boomers gave us Trump and Brexit. Can my generation age more gracefully?Generational politics is bullshit, but a Gen X guy would say that. I sometimes wonder, though, whether whatever is distinctive in my generation’s experience (and haunting our minds) might have something to offer the future.After a brief flurry of interest in the 1990s, thinkpieces on my demographic quickly waned. There were never that many of us; the meat in the sandwich was and is meagre. Continue reading...

Government advisers suggest homes are heated using low-carbon energy insteadGas hobs or boilers should be banned from being installed in new homes within the next six years, government advisers have recommended.A report by the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) says that from 2025 at the latest, no new homes should be connected to the gas grid – with super-efficient houses and flats heated using low-carbon energy instead. Continue reading...

Environmental campaigners say Samir Flores Soberanes’s murder is a ‘political crime’A Mexican environmental activist has been murdered before a referendum on a controversial thermal-electric plant and pipeline that he opposed.Samir Flores Soberanes, an indigenous Náhuatl, was killed in his home during the early hours of Wednesday in the town of Amilcingo in Morelos state, 80 miles south of Mexico City. He was a human rights activist, producer for a community radio station and long-time opponent of the Proyecto Integral Morelos (the integral project for Morelos) – which includes the plant and pipeline. Continue reading...

Hipster tastes have fueled a spike in succulent poaching. Now conservationists are finding creative ways to rescue themWhen most people drive through the Cactus Forest in Saguaro national park, their gazes are fixed skyward. Towering saguaros fill the view on either side of the road, rising 40, even 60ft high, their human-like arms outstretched.But on a recent December afternoon, Ray O’Neil was focused on the ground. He was looking for holes. As the park’s chief ranger, O’Neil is on constant alert for an unusual menace: cactus poachers. Saguaros aren’t just beautiful to look at; they also fetch a hefty price, up to $100 a foot, on the black market, where they are enormously popular with landscapers. Continue reading...

Plastic is everywhere, and it’s not going anywhere – potentially posing serious risks to our health. A crew of scientists and activists is conducting a hands-on investigationWhen I arrive at the marina in Victoria on a late-July morning, the sky and water are complementary shades of azure. On the deck of the 72ft shiny-bright Sea Dragon, moored here in the island capital of British Columbia for just one day, are four young women, part of the crew of the research voyage “eXXpedition”. They’re hauling buckets of black sludge up to the deck from the ocean floor.The team will meticulously pack the wet sand from the harbor floor into little glass jars. These jars will be added to a library of sand, water and air samples that they’ve collected over the past six weeks from across the north Pacific. They’ll ship some of those samples off to Plymouth, England, to be analyzed by eXXpedition’s marine scientist Imogen Napper. The idea is that by cataloging this library, she and the team will begin to get a better sense of what kind of plastic is out there in the ocean. Continue reading...

Republicans have claimed Ocasio-Cortez’s congressional resolutions will mean the end of ice cream, hamburgers and the US military. Where are they getting it from?Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the American political right’s objet socialiste du jour, recently introduced a Green New Deal – a joint Congressional resolution with Democratic senator Ed Markey calling for a “10-year national mobilization” overhauling nearly every aspect of American society to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Those who have read through it will find a hopeful and ambitious but dry legislative document.However, Ocasio-Cortez says that all Democratic presidential candidates support the Green New Deal, which has sent conservatives into a nonsensical tailspin, claiming it would mean the end of ice cream, hamburgers and the US military. Continue reading...

Clare Farrell ‘barred’ from Bethany Williams show despite role in producing fashion lineClare Farrell, co-founder of the environmental action group Extinction Rebellion, claimed she was barred from entering a show at London fashion week two days after helping to organise a protest against the British Fashion Council to highlight the industry’s role in fuelling climate change.About 150 people from Extinction Rebellion formed human roadblocks and brought traffic to a standstill outside event venues on Sunday to cause disruption and urge the industry body to declare a climate emergency. Continue reading...

Church of England among shareholders who pushed for environmental decisionThe commodities trader Glencore has bowed to pressure from shareholders, including the Church of England, to limit coal production for environmental reasons – days after reporting that it produced nearly 130m tonnes of the fossil fuel last year.The Switzerland-based firm, whose oil-trading operation is based in London, laid out plans to improve its environmental record, including a review of its membership of trade bodies it fears may be undermining the international Paris climate agreement. Continue reading...

The Faroes will be closed to tourists – except 100 volunteers – for a weekend in April as part of a campaign to promote tourism and sustainability

Pollution from Cannon air force base has gone unreported for decades. Now it’s threatening the US food supply

UK’s Molly Scott Cato among those held after action over stockpiling of US nuclear bombsThree Green MEPs – including one from the UK – have been arrested after breaking into a Belgian military airbase to protest against its stockpiling of American B61 nuclear bombs.The MEPs – Molly Scott Cato, Michèle Rivasi and Tilly Metz – unfurled a banner on a runway for F-16 fighter jets at the Kleine Brogel base in the east of the country calling for a nuclear-free Europe, before being taken into custody. Continue reading...

Research shows loss in yields could be offset by reorienting diets away from grain-fed meatEurope would still be able to feed its growing population even if it switched entirely to environmentally friendly approaches such as organic farming, according to a new report from a thinktank.A week after research revealed a steep decline in global insect populations that has been linked to the use of pesticides, the study from European thinktank IDDRI claims such chemicals can be phased out and greenhouse gas emissions radically reduced in Europe through agroecological farming, while still producing enough nutritious food for an increasing population. Continue reading...

Washington state’s Democratic governor wants to ‘put the pedal to the metal’ to save the planetThe US stands virtually alone in the world in having a leader who openly dismisses the reality of climate change. But amid growing concern among Americans about the overheating planet, one potential 2020 presidential candidate is aiming to hoist climate to the top of the agenda.Jay Inslee, the gravel-voiced governor of Washington, is poised to enter the throng of Democrats vying to dislodge Donald Trump as president in the 2020 election. He’s made some exploratory moves, visiting Nevada and New Hampshire, and said a definitive decision on running will be taken in “weeks”. Continue reading...

Scientists invited to collaborate on climate change following mass fish kills and royal commission findingsIn the wake of mass fish kills in the Menindee Lakes in January and scorching criticism of its stewardship of the Murray-Darling Basin, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority has announced that it will upgrade its scientific work on climate change and the river system.The authority’s chief executive, Phillip Glyde, has invited the scientific community to collaborate on its work on climate change. Continue reading...

Case against demolition of Allianz Stadium hears government failed to investigate reports of contaminationA legal challenge to the New South Wales government’s controversial plan to demolish Sydney’s Allianz Stadium before next month’s state election has heard the government “suppressed” the release of a report showing the site was contaminated with potentially carcinogenic material.Local Democracy Matters, a group set up to fight the amalgamation of Randwick and Waverley councils 18 months ago, is seeking to halt the demolition of the stadium before the election by arguing the government failed to follow its own planning rules. Continue reading...

A million tonnes of spoil to be disposed of in marine park – prompting calls for a ban on all offshore dumpingThe Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has approved the dumping of more than 1m tonnes of dredge spoil near the reef, using a loophole in federal laws that were supposed to protect the marine park.The Greens senator Larissa Waters has called for the permit – which allows maintenance dredging to be carried out over 10 years at Mackay’s Hay Point port and the sludge to be dumped within the marine park’s boundaries – to be revoked. Continue reading...

Flood risk in the region likely to increase by 130% by end of century, modelling showsHouses in flood-hit Townsville and other parts of north Queensland are “on track to become uninsurable”, according to analysis that shows the risk to homes from flooding will more than double under climate change.The modelling, based on current global emissions trajectories, says flooding in Townsville is already about 20% more to likely to occur than previously thought. The total flood risk in the region is likely to increase by 130% by the end of the century. Continue reading...

European health report finds Britain has highest mortality rate of countries studiedYoung Britons are dying from asthma at a higher rate than any of the other European countries examined in a new study, researchers have revealed.Experts have found the UK is languishing near the bottom of an international league table for a host of problems, including obesity, lack of exercise in children and the burden of chronic health issues – and in many cases the situation is getting worse. Continue reading...

Tuesday’s top story: Bernie Sanders launches 2020 presidential bid. Plus, how the world got hooked on palm oilGood morning, I’m Tim Walker with today’s essential stories. Continue reading...

At the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Nevada, friends and performers with wide-ranging views met to discuss climate change, immigration and other concerns ‘without demonizing each other’Several weeks ahead of the 35th annual National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nevada, Gail Steiger, a rancher and singer-songwriter from Yavapai county, Arizona, emailed a proposal to a small host of close friends and fellow performers.“None of us fit easily in any box, but we all hold each other in high regard,” he wrote. Continue reading...

The controversial legal bill will allow citizens to sue a polluter on behalf of the lake and for penalties to be imposedIn early August 2014, Crystal Jankowski was late in her pregnancy and knew she was about due. In was hot and humid where she lived in Toledo, Ohio and she remembers just wanting to relax in a cool shower.But the graphic designer could not take one. The water source for Toledo is Lake Erie, and an algae bloom caused in part by phosphorous runoff from farms had sickened the lake with an overload of “microcystin” bacteria. The city banned drinking the water for a week and “children, the elderly and pregnant women” were instructed not to even shower. Continue reading...

Eminent members of legal profession, including a former supreme court judge, critical of law firm’s strategy documentThe Adani mining company’s “legal intimidation” tactics against community groups are a “threat to democracy” and “gravely concerning”, say eminent members of the legal profession, including a former supreme court judge and an expert on corporate lawfare.The ABC reported on Tuesday that a law firm hired by Adani, AJ & Co, wrote a strategy document urging the Indian miner to “play the man” and adopt an aggressive legal posture against opponents. Continue reading...