This map shows the scale of land clearing in Australia by visualising the extent of clearing in states where data is availableAustralia is in the midst of a land clearing crisis. Some estimate that 3m hectares of woodland will be cleared between 2010 and 2030.This is having a huge impact on the environment. Loss of habitat is one of the main threats to about three-quarters of Australia’s 1,640 plants and animals listed by the government as at risk. Land clearing, and land-use changes that follow it, have caused a fivefold increase in the sediment pollution pouring on to the embattled Great Barrier Reef, further diminishing its ability to deal with climate change. Continue reading...

Owners fear for health of lemurs, marmosets, monkeys, birds and tortoises removed from Miami site in incident police are treating as theftThe advertisement on Craigslist was specific: “Free exotic animals. We’re a sanctuary going out of business. Go around back and help yourself.”

Thousands sent home in West Midlands as Severn Trent prioritises households amid dwindling supplyThousands of staff at two Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) car plants have been sent home, while chocolate production has been halted at Cadbury’s Bourneville factory, amid water shortages in the West Midlands caused by burst water mains after the recent cold weather.The local water company, Severn Trent, said it had asked a “handful of big businesses” to shut down factories as it tried to prioritise household supplies. Continue reading...

New treaty compels states to investigate and punish killings and attacks on people defending their land or environmentOfficials from 24 Latin American and Caribbean states have signed a legally binding environmental rights pact containing measures to protect land defenders, almost two years to the day since environmental leader Berta Cáceres was killed in her home in Honduras.Last year almost 200 nature protectors were killed across the world, 60% of them in Latin America. The new treaty obliges states to “guarantee a safe and enabling environment for persons, groups and organisations that promote and defend human rights in environmental matters”. Continue reading...

Replacing the government-controlled system by private companies made the costs of the delivery process soar, writes David Reed. Plus letters from John Heawood and Mark LewinskiPrivatising our vital energy services was a disaster waiting to happen, though the Tories daren’t admit it (Row over rise in energy bills for 1m households, 3 March). Every house has one set of cables carrying electricity and one set of pipes with gas; in addition, all the key energy market prices are set nationally, regionally or even globally, so there can be little or no competition in supply costs. You could argue that having more buyers actually increases competition, pushing prices higher.We may not realise it, but it has been cold in all of Europe, so price rises are inevitable. As your report says, the 7.9% rise in prices in the last six months was “driven primarily by increases in wholesale gas and electricity costs”. How will the government’s much-vaunted price cap help with that? I have changed suppliers almost every year in the last five or more years, but my bills are higher than ever, for a very simple reason: replacing the government-controlled system by more than a dozen private companies, all with highly paid chief executives and shareholders to keep happy, made the costs of the delivery process soar. How could it not? Continue reading...

Only five habitats put on critical habitat register since national environmental laws enactedAustralia has not listed any critical habitat for the protection of threatened species on the federal critical habitat register for more than a decade.And only five places have been registered on the database since Australia’s national environmental laws – the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act – were enacted.

Ex-UN secretary general tells the Guardian decision to withdraw hampers global political actionDonald Trump’s decision to withdraw the US from the Paris agreement has created serious problems for global efforts to tackle climate change, Ban Ki-moon has said.The former UN secretary general said Trump’s move was politically damaging to international action to limit carbon emissions and had created difficulties in delivering financial aid from richer to poorer countries to help the latter cope with a warming world. Continue reading...

Starfish and crabs among animals piled ankle-deep along parts of the North Sea coastMassive numbers of starfish, crab, mussels and lobsters have been washed up on the North Sea coast of the UK, following the recent freezing weather and storms.

Designer has been doing ethical fashion since 2001 – finally the rest of the world is catching up

EDF’s Torness plant east of Edinburgh has previously been taken offline due to jellyfishRoving jellyfish and seaweed have long been unwanted guests at Scotland’s last two nuclear power stations. Now the marine algae have hit again, forcing one of the plants to partially power down despite freezing temperatures pushing up demand for electricity.During last week’s cold weather, excessive amounts of seaweed entered the cooling system of the Torness plant in East Lothian, causing one reactor to be closed on Thursday. Continue reading...

Number of new cars registered in February falls by 2.8% despite rises in petrol and electric salesSlumping demand for diesel vehicles dragged down new car sales in February, marking the 11th consecutive month of declines for Britain’s new car market.The number of new cars registered dropped 2.8% compared to the same month a year ago to 80,805, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), the industry trade body. The rate of decline has slowed from the double-digit drops seen at the end of last year. Continue reading...

The fault lies entirely with the GOP. Focus on fixing it, not laying blame where it doesn’t belongSteven Pinker is a cognitive psychologist, linguist, and author of Bill Gates’ two favorite books. However, his latest – Enlightenment Now – has some serious shortcomings centering on Pinker’s misperceptions about climate change polarization. Pinker falls into the trap of ‘Both Siderism,’ acknowledging the Republican Party’s science denial, but also wrongly blaming liberals for the policy stalemate, telling Ezra Klein:there is implacable opposition to nuclear energy in much of the environmental movement ... There are organizations like Greenpeace and NRDC who are just dead set opposed to nuclear. There are also people on the left like Naomi Klein who are dead set against carbon pricing because it doesn’t punish the polluters enough ... the people that you identify who believe in a) carbon pricing and b) expansion of nuclear power, I suspect they’re a tiny minority of the people concerned with climate … What we need are polling data on how many people really would support carbon pricing and an expansion of nuclear and other low carbon energy sources. Continue reading...

Our food – from what we eat to how it is grown – accounts for more carbon emissions than transport and yet staple crops will be hit hard by global warming

Demise of the beetles, that need rotting wood to survive, could have devastating knock-on effect for other species, say scientists in a new reportAlmost one-fifth of Europe’s wood beetles are at risk of extinction due to a widespread decline in ancient trees, according to a new report which suggests their demise could have devastating knock-on effects for other species.The study says 18% of saproxylic beetles – which depend on dead and decaying wood for some of their lifecycle – now exist on a conservation plane between “vulnerable” and “critically endangered”. Continue reading...

Helvellyn, Lake District The combination of deep, drifting snow and mountain wind creates absorbing patterns

Murray-Darling Basin Authority report echoes farmers’ fears irrigators are causing the river to run dry, not the weatherMost of the Murray-Darling system has been placed on red or amber alert for outbreaks of blue-green algae as a new report finds that the increasing incidence in low-flow or no-flow events is due to irrigators extracting more water from the system. Continue reading...

Fiona Howie, Tom Greeves, Andrew Gilruth and Amanda Anderson respond to George Monbiot’s article on reclaiming our national parksGeorge Monbiot raises some legitimate concerns about the management of parts of our national parks (Here’s a novel idea: protecting wildlife in our national parks, 28 February) but to write off all 15 of them entirely is nonsense.Monbiot says: “Much of the land in our national parks is systematically burned.” But they are more than just moorlands; they contain one-third of England’s public forest estate. Northumberland contains some of the cleanest rivers in England; the New Forest includes a special area of conservation, an EU designation, that encompasses almost 30,000 hectares; and the Pembrokeshire coast some of the most biodiverse coastal habitats. Continue reading...

Cat Burton, Steve Emsley and Geoff Williams on using the car batteries to turn up the heat in their electric vehicles when neededI had to laugh at John Richards’s worry about people freezing in stuck electric vehicles because their batteries would run down in “no time” while those in a petrol car could run their heater (Letters, 3 March). Running the heated seats and climate control for about seven hours costs about three miles of range for my Tesla and it’s probably something similar for a petrol or diesel car. The big difference is, the electric vehicle won’t be killing the occupants with carbon monoxide poisoning. Indeed, the advice has always been not to run the engine if stuck.Teslas have a 12v battery for “domestic” uses and a 400v battery for motive power. The 400v kicks in to recharge the 12v when needed. Think of the 400v battery as the equivalent of running the engine to top up the battery.

Threatened species, pressure on Great Barrier Reef and climate change all worsened by full-blown land-clearing crisis

Environment department originally wrote to landowners asking them to show why planned clearing was not illegal, but later reversed courseAttempts by the federal government to stop potentially unlawful clearing in Queensland were reversed after political intervention, with a highly unusual apology letter sent to every landholder suspected of planning unlawful clearing at the direct request of the minister, documents obtained by the Guardian under FOI laws reveal.In December 2015 and January 2016, the federal department of environment took the exceptional step of asking 51 landholders with approval from the Queensland government to clear their land, to explain why the clearing wasn’t unlawful under federal environmental law. Continue reading...

Environment Agency issues 16 flood warnings and 35 flood alerts as country thaws outThe cold snap, in which the UK has been hit by hazardous conditions and freezing temperatures, is coming to an end. But high tides and easterly winds could mean flooding for several parts of Britain, particularly in the coastal areas in the south-west and north-east.Some areas will enjoy temperatures as warm as 10C (50F) on Sunday and Monday, although Scotland, parts of Northern Ireland and the north of England will remain cool for a few more days.

Demand from Chinese workers raises demand for skin and body parts of endangered speciesConservationists who have uncovered a growing illegal trade in jaguar fangs in South America are linking it to Chinese construction projects that could be threatening wildlife globally.Experts say major Chinese power plant, road and rail works in developing nations are key stimulants of illicit trade in the skins, bones and horns of endangered animals. Continue reading...

Last week’s brief but unnerving shortfall was a reminder, if any were needed, of the central importance of energy efficiencyCarry on cooking as normal, the energy minister said. This is how the market works, said industry experts, as the wholesale price of gas rocketed 200% in the wake of National Grid’s warning on Thursday that the country was facing a gas shortfall. In other words, don’t panic, nothing to see here.To an extent, they’re right. In the short term the UK was fine, despite huge demand fuelled by cold weather coinciding with a series of interruptions to supply. No domestic gas supplies were cut off and neither was National Grid forced to ask industrial users to stop using gas. Continue reading...

Campaigners want inquiry into overall strategy to examine how effective culling has beenThe government is to review the controversial badger cull as part of an inquiry into its strategy to clamp down on bovine TB.The review raises the possibility that experts conducting it will examine disputed evidence about the cull’s efficacy, potentially paving the way for a change in policy. Continue reading...

An earthly paradise is ravaged by inferno and flood, the earth itself rising to proclaim a horrifying and deadly new normalWhen people ask me where I live and I say, “Santa Barbara,” I wait for the inevitable reply, “Paradise,” and the quizzical look that says, how does one live there, rather than vacation. It’s as if I had replied, Disneyland.People who visit from colder climates have been complaining lately. Last year, when it finally rained after six years of drought, and we were practically on our knees with gratitude, a woman from New England remarked, “I didn’t come here for the rain.” I almost said, “Well, then, why don’t you go back home?” Another pestered a friend: when was her club in Montecito going to open? My friend replied, “I think it’s under eight feet of mud.” She wanted to add, “And they’re still looking for the bodies.” Continue reading...

Company sued Quebec township of 157 people after it created a no-drill zone, fearing for its water supplyA small municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec that was facing a million-dollar lawsuit from an oil and gas exploration company has won its court battle, bringing an end to a four-year ordeal that began when residents took steps to protect their water supply.“Reason and law prevailed today,” François Boulay, the mayor of Ristigouche Sud-Est, a township of 157 people on Quebec’s Gaspé Peninsula, said in a statement. “We are relieved that our right to protect our drinking water is finally recognised.” Continue reading...

Caroline Lucas derides ‘fluffy communications strategy’ and ‘inadequate’ action on plasticsThe Conservative party’s rhetoric on the environment is a “fluffy communications strategy” when change on plastics could happen in half the time pledged, the co-leader of the Greens has said ahead of her party conference speech.Caroline Lucas will use her speech on Saturday in Bournemouth to call for petrol and diesel-only new cars to be phased out by 2030 and a deposit return scheme on drinks containers to be launched by the end of the year. Continue reading...

Inshriach, Aviemore Tracks revealed the badger and I had been cohabiting all this time. I just wasn’t looking hard enough

House lawmakers say Russia backed Dakota Access pipeline protesters and supported them on social media, but evidence is thinA powerful US congressional committee has alleged that Russia financed major environmental organizations and used social media to support opponents of the Dakota Access pipeline, fracking and fossil fuels.

If the trend continues, researchers warn, the migration of blacktip sharks could grind to a halt because of the rapidly warming oceanBlacktip sharks that journey down the Florida coast have declined in number so sharplythat researchers warn one of the largest migrations in US waters could grind to a halt because of the rapidly warming ocean. Continue reading...

Olive ridley sea turtles, a sparrowhawk and Europe’s highest sand dune are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world Continue reading...

Working people will end up with fewer resources and less collective power if the US supreme court undermines the power of unions with its decision on JanusThis week the US supreme court may have given the Koch Brothers yet another tool to help them achieve something they have been dreaming of for decades: weakening the power of public-sector unions.Oral arguments were held on Monday 26 February on Janus v AFSCME, a case that some have called the most important labor case of the century. The aim of the plaintiff’s case is to eliminate “fair share fees”, dividing public sector workers and limiting their power in numbers. If the supreme court finds in favor of the plaintiff, as they are widely expected to, public sector unions will no longer be able to collect fees automatically from the employees they represent, and these unions’ ability to operate will be dramatically undermined. Continue reading...

Climate change is forcing indigenous people to find new ways to survive as a remote village of 600 grapples with rapid erosionAt the edge of an imperiled Alaska town, Dennis Davis sent a drone over a patchwork of ice covering the Chukchi Sea.“Some people think it’s a toy, but a lot of people know that it’s an actual tool,” he said of the $5,000, microwave-sized machine with a camera mounted to a carbon fiber frame. As snowmachines zoomed past, Davis, 39, a resident and former police officer, looked at the pictures that were beamed back. Continue reading...

The discovery shows the remote area is a vital refuge for wildlife from climate change and overfishing and should be protected by a new reserve, say scientistsHuge “mega-colonies” of penguins have been discovered near the Antarctic peninsula, hosting more than 1.5 million birds. Researchers say it shows the area is a vital refuge from climate change and human activities and should be protected by a vast new marine wildlife reserve currently under consideration.

Two more defenders in Latin America have lost their lives challenging their country’s economic growth model which prizes profit at all costAs the Guardian and Global Witness revealed that almost four environmental defenders were murdered every week in 2017, War on Want learned of two more killings through our Latin American partner organisations.On 24 January, Márcio “Marcinho” Matos, involved in the fight for rights of landless peasants in Bahia in north-east Brazil, was shot in front of his son. Three days later, Temístocles “don Temis” Machado, a prominent figure in the struggle of Afro-Colombian communities across the Colombian Pacific, was murdered in his home in the Isla de Paz community. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Kemper power plant promised to be a world leader in ‘clean coal’ technology but Guardian reporting found evidence top executives knew of construction problems and design flaws years before the scheme collapsedHigh above the red dirt and evergreen trees of Kemper County, Mississippi, gleams a 15-story monolith of pipes surrounded by a town-sized array of steel towers and white buildings. The hi-tech industrial site juts out of the surrounding forest, its sharp silhouette out of place amid the gray crumbling roads, catfish stands and trailer homes of nearby De Kalb, population: 1,164.The $7.5bn Kemper power plant once drew officials from as far as Saudi Arabia, Japan and Norway to marvel at a 21st-century power project so technologically complex its builder compared it to the moonshot of the 1960s. It’s promise? Energy from “clean coal”. Continue reading...

Disclosure regarding the $7.5bn Kemper plant in Mississippi throws further cloud over promise of clean coal energy

Dame Sally Davies says issue is not just environmental and calls on UK government to bring in tougher standards to tackle toxic airEngland’s chief medical officer is calling on the government to do more to reduce air pollution by introducing stringent new national standards to reduce the threat to human health.Dame Sally Davies says pollution must be seen as a public health issue and not just an environmental concern. She recommends the government bring in tougher standards to cut air pollution and standardise any road charging introduced to cut nitrogen dioxide pollution from diesel traffic. Continue reading...

The Royal Horticultural Society also warns that a ‘game-changing’ bacterial disease called xylella poses a very serious danger to UK plants and treesThe box tree caterpillar and fuchsia gall mite will continue their march across British gardens in 2018, experts warn, after the fast-spreading bugs topped the Royal Horticultural Society’s (RHS) pest list for 2017.The RHS also warned that a “game-changing” bacterial disease called xylella, which is devastating parts of southern Europe and has already been intercepted at the UK border, is a very serious danger to UK plants and trees. Continue reading...

Range including leaves, bushes and trees made entirely from plant-based plastic sourced from sugar cane will be available later this yearThe first Lego pieces made from plant-based plastic sourced from sugar cane will go on sale this year, the company has announced.The 85-year-old Danish toymaker said production has begun on a range of Lego botanical elements or pieces such as leaves, bushes and trees, made entirely from plant-based plastic. They will start appearing in Lego box sets with bricks and mini-figures later this year. Continue reading...

Chideock, Dorset: It takes five workers eight hours to thrash three acres worth of wheat reed. That’s enough to thatch the average 30-foot cottageThe smell strikes you first. A mealy odour, dry and tickly, of clean straw and grain. Beneath it, a hint of juiciness, from bruised ears of wheat beaten to release their kernels. Seeds shaken free leap and bounce into the waiting trailer. Some will be sown for next year’s crop; the rest go for cattle feed. Continue reading...

Labor leader dodges questions about plan to revoke Adani licence if he wins next electionBill Shorten has repeatedly denied that he told colleagues he intended to ban the Adani coal mine, but dodged questions about whether he intended to revoke its licence if Labor wins the next election.Shorten was asked on Friday to clarify Labor’s position after the businessman and environmentalist Geoff Cousins this week gave a detailed account of private discussions he had with the Labor leader over December and January. Continue reading...

Environmental groups welcome move but want freeze on mining expansion until review is finalCoalmining in Sydney’s drinking water catchment will be scrutinised by water experts, the New South Wales Department of Planning and Environment has announced.Enviroment groups, which have been warning for years of the impact of coalmining on drinking water welcomed the move but called for a moratorium on any expansion of mining activity until the conclusion of the review. Continue reading...

Government-funded researchers urge change in way clean energy is funded to reduce burden on poorest householdsThe richest households should pay £410 a year more towards supporting energy subsidies for wind farms, solar rooftops and home insulation schemes, government-funded researchers have urged.The UK Energy Research Centre (Ukerc) said that shifting environmental and social levies off electricity bills and instead loading them on to general taxation would reduce the cost of energy for more than two thirds of households. Continue reading...

Global shareholders file motion calling for rethink on membership of coal lobby groupsThe voice of Australia’s coal lobby is under renewed threat as the country’s second biggest miner, Rio Tinto, faces a shareholder revolt over its membership of lobby groups including the Minerals Council of Australia and the role it plays in Australia’s climate and energy debate.Global investors worth $84bn have joined together to file a shareholder motion calling on Rio Tinto to rethink its membership of the MCA, NSW Minerals Council (NSWMC) and the Queensland Resources Council (QRC). It demands Rio Tinto reveal all membership fees paid since 2012, review the consistency of the MCA’s lobbying positions with those held by Rio Tinto, and disclose what it would take for Rio to quit its membership of the MCA. Continue reading...

Whitehaven Coal receives second extension while it continues to bulldoze critically endangered NSW forest to make way for mineFive years after the controversial Maules Creek coalmine in north-east New South Wales was given approval to clear critically endangered native ecosystems, Whitehaven Coal has still not secured the biodiversity offsets demanded by the federal government, receiving a second extension in February.The delay has led opponents to call for offsets – intended to make up for lost ecosystems – to be established prior to the destruction taking place. Continue reading...

Deal worth $6bn allows Malcolm Turnbull to proceed with plan to expand hydro to boost east coast gridThe Turnbull government has agreed to buy stakes held by New South Wales and Victoria in the Snowy Hydro project for more than $6bn. The agreement, clinched late on Thursday by Malcolm Turnbull, makes the commonwealth the sole owner of the project.It allows the federal government to proceed with its $4.5bn plan to expand Snowy Hydro’s generation capacity by 50%, to benefit the east coast electricity grid. Continue reading...

Burning wood releases more COthan gas, oil and even coal for the same amount of heat, so to make it climate neutral we need an increase in forestsWith snow on the ground, many people will have been huddling around a wood fire, but researchers are questioning if wood burning is really climate neutral. Burning wood is not CO free; it releases carbon, stored over the previous decades, in one quick burst. For an equal amount of heat or electricity, it releases more CO than burning gas, oil and even coal, so straight away we have more CO in the air from burning wood. This should be reabsorbed as trees regrow. For logs from mature Canadian woodland, it could take more than 100 years before the atmospheric CO is less than the alternative scenario of burning a fossil fuel and leaving the trees in the forest.Related: Wood fires fuel climate change – UN Continue reading...

Deal with Eastern Australia Agriculture, which was done without a tender, raises questions over taxpayer valueOne of Australia’s largest cotton companies, Eastern Australia Agriculture (EAA), sold water rights to the federal government in July last year for $79m and then booked a $52m gain on the sale.The deal, which was done without tender, will raise questions about whether the government paid over the odds for the water in southern Queensland. Continue reading...