VW, BMW, Opel and Daimler’s promise to fix 5 million cars not enough to undo the damage done by emissions scandal, say campaignersMajor car makers are being accused of clutching at straws after they agreed to fit software to 5m diesel vehicles in Germany to reduce harmful emissions by up to 30%.VW, Daimler, BMW and Opel made the decision at a summit with leading politicians in Berlin. They have been under pressure since the diesel emissions scandal two years ago exposed how VW and – it is suspected – other manufacturers have been cheating the testing regime. Continue reading...

Scott Pruitt claims change is testament to responsiveness but makes no mention of legal challenge over Obama-era rules to lessen ground-level ozoneOne day after getting sued by 15 states, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief, Scott Pruitt, reversed his decision to delay implementation of Obama-era rules reducing emissions of smog-causing air pollutants.Pruitt presented the change as his agency being more responsive than past administrations to the needs of state environmental regulators. He made no mention of the legal challenge filed against his prior position in a federal appeals court. Continue reading...

Over four decades of exploration and extraction have caused an environmental and health crisis in indigenous communitiesWho is going to clean up Peru’s northern Amazon after decades of companies spilling oil and dumping billions of barrels of toxic production waters? Certainly not US company Occidental which ran the biggest concession, Lot 1-AB, until 2000, nor, it would seem, Petroperu, which ran the other major concession, Lot 8, until 1996 and operates the rusty, leaking North Peruvian Pipeline to this day.Nor Pluspetrol, a company founded in Argentina and now registered in the Netherlands which took over both Lot 1-AB and Lot 8, if its actions to date are anything to go by. Nor the China National Petroleum Corporation, which bought 45% stakes in both concessions in 2003. Nor the subsidiary of a Canadian company now called Frontera Energy which, in 2015, when Lot 1-AB’s name was effectively changed to Lot 192, bought 100% of operations in a two year temporary contract. Continue reading...

Deforestation and climate change appear to be amplifying droughts in the Amazon

Researchers are racing for answers after at least 10 deaths of north Atlantic right whales, marking the deadliest year since tracking beganResearchers are scrambling to figure out why one of the world’s most endangered whale species is dying in “unprecedented” numbers, after at least 10 north Atlantic right whales have been found floating lifelessly off the coast of Canada.The first whale carcass was reported in early June. Within a month, another six reports came in, leaving researchers reeling. This week, after several carcasses washed up on the shores of western Newfoundland, Canadian officials confirmed that the number of whale deaths had risen to at least 10, making 2017 the deadliest year for the whales since researchers began tracking them in the 1980s. Continue reading...

Madrid has its scheme, while Muswell Hill’s never happened. Hilly cities from Rome to Rio will be watching as Lisbon starts e-bike hireWander around Lisbon’s city centre with its vertiginous cobbled streets, treacherous enough on foot in the rain, it’s hard to imagine cycling ever taking off. Some streets are so steep there are funiculars to help you scale them, and Lisboetas on bikes are a rare sight outside of summer.

Hamsterley Forest, Weardale Their visual sensitivity challenges us and their ability to track small fast objects is unparalleled

Exclusive: Senate inquiry told the Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund is ‘sorely wanting’ on transparencyA group of prominent economists have told a Senate inquiry the Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund (Naif) is “sorely wanting” on transparency, accountability and its track record for public disclosure, and called on it to make major changes to the way it operates.In a submission to the Senate inquiry into the governance and operation of Naif, the group discusses the potential $900m loan to Adani for a rail link to its proposed Carmichael coalmine as a case study, and raises serious concerns about the way the body operates. Continue reading...

Highways Agency studies Dutch scheme using ‘cantilevered canopies’ covered with pollution-absorbing material in effort to improve air qualityMajor roads could be turned into tunnels covered with pollution-absorbing material in an effort to cut emission fumes and improve air quality.Highways Agency officials are studying a Dutch scheme in which cantilevered canopies are constructed over the most polluted sections of road to prevent local residents breathing in noxious car fumes. Continue reading...

National Trust chief says seamless transition in funding is vital post-Brexit to protect countryside from short-termismBritish farmers are returning to intensive measures that deplete wildlife and damage the environment as a vacuum in government policy leaves them facing an uncertain future after the Brexit vote, the director general of the National Trust is warning.In an outspoken message to ministers, Dame Helen Ghosh says action is needed now to create a seamless transition of subsidies and green incentives for farmers after the UK leaves the EU in order to avoid creating a decade of uncertainty in the countryside. Continue reading...

If warming is not tackled, levels of humid heat that can kill within hours will affect millions across south Asia within decades, analysis findsExtreme heatwaves that kill even healthy people within hours will strike parts of the Indian subcontinent unless global carbon emissions are cut sharply and soon, according to new research.

Two recently fledged night herons have been seen at Somerset’s Westhay Moor nature reserve, which suspects climate change drew their parents northNight herons are among the most mysterious of birds, and for the first time in recorded history they have been spotted breeding in the UK.Long-distance photographs captured an adult pair of black-crowned herons and one of their two offspring at the Westhay Moor national nature reserve, run by Somerset Wildlife Trust. The young birds have recently fledged, having been born either on Westhay Moor or the nearby Avalon Marshes. Continue reading...

Council apologises for serious errors in air quality readings over three years and says it is reviewing planning applicationsA local authority has admitted its air pollution data was deliberately manipulated for three years to make it look cleaner.Cheshire East council apologised after serious errors were made in air quality readings from 2012 to 2014. Continue reading...

As bin collectors’ strike enters fifth week, volunteers in Balsall Heath and Small Heath are using tipper truck to clear streetsVolunteers in Birmingham will hit the streets in a tipper truck on Wednesday as they attempt to clean the area of rubbish which has been piling up because of a refuse collectors’ strike.Workers began a series of walkouts on 30 June after an industrial dispute between unions and Birmingham city council over job losses. Continue reading...

Video from Dr Greg Skomal shows the moment a curious white shark took a GoPro camera in its mouth. The fish, seen off the Monomoy national wildlife refuge in Massachusetts on Monday, is believed to have been 12ft (3.6 metres) long. Skomal works for the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries and the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy

Rules put in place before the national Murray-Darling basin plan favour larger irrigators, say experts and farmersFarmers and water experts say New South Wales government rule changes could be causing more water loss to the Murray-Darling river system than before the national plan was put in place.

Researcher says emissions from fracking in the basin could be ‘far bigger than everything you’d get’ from the proposed Queensland mineFracking the McArthur basin could release four to five times as much greenhouse gas emissions as the proposed Adani Carmichael mine, a leading researcher has said.

Some global corporations are trying to address the environmental impact of throwaway culture, but campaigners say they remain part of the problemWhen John Sauven, executive director at Greenpeace UK, heard a woman complain on the radio that supermarket croissants were cheaper to buy wrapped in plastic than paper, he was so startled he went straight to his local Co-op“It was true,” Sauven said at a recent Guardian roundtable discussion on the future of waste. “If I bought two croissants in a brown paper bag, it was 79p [each], and if I bought them in a big plastic container it was 63p [each]. And I just thought ... this is a complete failure of the system.” Continue reading...

Ski resort of Alta Badia enters the craze for cycling sportives allowing amateurs to experience closed-roads settingsA ski resort in Italy is experimenting with closing sections of its mountain roads in an effort to become a mecca for road cyclists during the summer season.Alta Badia in the Italian Dolomites has hosted three “bike only” days this summer to boost its cyclo-tourism credentials and capitalise on the trend for closed-roads sportives. Continue reading...

Cancellation and downgrading of projects will lengthen journey times and increase costs, says partyScrapping rail electrification projects will lengthen journey times, increase carbon emissions and raise the cost of running the network, the Labour party has warned. The transport secretary, Chris Grayling, announced in July that plans to electrify lines in Wales, the Midlands and the North have been cancelled or downgraded.Labour has claimed that this would increase journey times, including those between Manchester and Liverpool, by nearly half an hour, and between Leeds and Newcastle by over 20 minutes. It also puts the estimated 19-minute cut to journey times from new trains between Swansea and London at risk, according to the analysis. Continue reading...

Attingham, Shropshire Over centuries people have watched with wonder these almost unreal, too bright, too quick insectsThe banded demoiselles are dancing like laser lights over the river Tern. There is something CGI about these creatures: too bright, too quick, too beautiful to be real.The banded demoiselle is large for a damselfly, small for a dragonfly; a 40mm long emerald-cobalt pin with gauzy wings marked with the indigo fingerprints of when they were plucked from the water, or so it seems. Continue reading...

The Adani Group almost seems like a crudely drawn corporate villain. And we should be thankful for the chance to reclaim the fight

Huw Jones charts the impact on farming of cuts in support and Michael McLoughlin looks at the causes of suicide among Indian farmersPolly Toynbee (The Tories are split over farming. It’s hard not to gloat, 1 August) raises important issues. Subsidies were intended to lower food prices and increase discretionary income for manufactured products. The subsidy fills the gap between production costs and farm-gate prices, which were lowered by imports and by allowing food-chain “efficiencies” resulting in domination by the supermarkets. The inflexibility of EU-wide subsidies resulted a few years ago in tiny farm incomes, despite substantial investment in farms. This, combined with oppressive and chaotic management of subsidies by Defra, resulted in support for Brexit. Loss of subsidies will result in the closure of most affected farms that cannot subsidise themselves with non-farming income. Perhaps the price of rural holidays will have to increase.You also report increased suicide rates amongst Indian farmers due to climate change (Farmers’ suicides linked to climate, 1 August), but suicides in response to agricultural depression are not uncommon in UK, either. Meanwhile, BNP Paribas is buying Strutt and Parker (Report, 1 August), famous for major land sales. French bankers clearly see a growing opportunity in selling distressed UK farms. Buyers will keep huge areas under common management, regardless of local land quality and ecosystems. Merged farms will need to use large suppliers, while smaller suppliers will go out of business. Small rural communities and dedicated local infrastructure will become unsustainable, reducing opportunities for tourism or even online businesses. Changes to subsidies will affect far more people than just farmers and will need to be considered very carefully.

Energy prices | Moeen Ali | Prudish chemists | Gay chants | LiberalismIt is disappointing to see such a large price rise from British Gas (Report, 1 August), but let’s not slam these suppliers for being greedy. They’re inefficient and outmoded – and it’s customers who pay the price. Energy doesn’t have to be this expensive, as proven by the dozens of newer suppliers with lower costs and better service. The only way to fix the broken energy market and the stranglehold of the big six is with the urgent introduction of an energy price cap which will benefit all families.

Elephant and tiger territories are shrinking as India’s growing population encroaches on wild spaces causing an increase in fatalitiesA deadly conflict is under way between India’s growing population and its wildlife confined to ever-shrinking forests and grasslands. Data shows that about one person has been killed on average every day for the past three years by roaming tigers or rampaging elephants.Statistics released this week by India’s environment ministry reveal that 1,144 people were killed between April 2014 and May 2017. That figure breaks down to 426 human deaths in 2014-15, and 446 the following year. The ministry released only a partial count for 2016-17, with 259 people killed by elephants up to February of this year, and 27 killed by tigers through May. Continue reading...

With no fossil flowers older than 130m years, their evolution has long been a mystery. A new structural discovery provides an important piece of the puzzleDelicate and upturned, with curving petals arranged in threes, it looks like the subject of a Monet painting. In fact, it is what scientists believe the bloom of the last common ancestor of all living flowers looked like.Flowering plants – or angiosperms – are thought to make up about 90% of all living land plants. There are more than 300,000 different species on the planet, from tiny forget-me-nots to glorious magnolias. Continue reading...

A new report shows toxins from suppliers to companies like Tyson Foods are pouring into waterways, causing marine life to leave or dieThe global meat industry, already implicated in driving global warming and deforestation, has now been blamed for fueling what is expected to be the worst “dead zone” on record in the Gulf of Mexico.

The electric utility sector is broken – but the transformation we need will be virtually impossible so long as a handful of wealthy elites are calling the shotsA new report from the US-based Energy and Policy Institute last week found that investor-owned utilities have known about climate change for nearly 50 years – and done everything in their power to stop governments from doing anything about it.From their commitment to toxic fuels to their corrosive influence on our democracy to their attempts to price-gouge ratepayers, it’s long past time to bring the reign of privately-owned electric utilities to an end. Continue reading...

Whether basking in sunshine in the northern hemisphere or fighting cooler temperatures in the south, we’d like to see the wildlife you discoverWherever you are in the world and however professional or amateur your photography set up, we would like to see your images of the wildlife living near you.Related: Otters, geese and grebes: your photos as the Wetland Trust turns 70 Continue reading...

There are parallels between today’s and past greenhouse gas-driven climate changes

Rare images of wild tigers in Bhutan, captured by camera traps, show tigers and other animals using high-altitude wildlife corridors which are lifelines to isolated tiger populations and critical to genetic diversity, conservation and growth Continue reading...

When Jakarta ditched its controversial ‘three-in-one’ car-sharing rule many in the city expected the traffic to get better. It didn’t. A Harvard and MIT study analysed before-and-after Google traffic data to find out what happenedDriving in Jakarta at rush hour is something of a nightmare. The city’s 9.6 million population swells each work day with an additional 3.5 million people travelling in from outskirts, mostly by car or bus. Driving 25 miles from the suburb Bogor takes on average two hours, or even three. By some measures, Jakarta has the worst traffic in the world. Others only put it in the top 25; regardless, Jakarta drivers are guaranteed to spend significant portions of their lives stuck in gridlock.To help alleviate the problem, the city implemented one of the world’s most stringent car-pooling policies. First launched in 2003, the “three-in-one” high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lane rule required private vehicles to carry three people to drive on the main roads in Jakarta’s central business district, from 7-10am and 4.30-7pm. Continue reading...

Millers Dale, Derbyshire A galaxy of tiny purple globes sway where once the milk churns waited for the night train to LondonThe old railway station in this part of Derbyshire’s Wye valley presents an astonishing happenstance of mixed colour. There is the Van Gogh yellow of the ragwort and the dark mullein spikes. There are the blended lilacs of field scabious and the rose shades from wild marjoram and over most of the area towers a canopy of greater and black knapweed flowers creating a galaxy of tiny purple globes. In the wind, all these colours sway and mingle.My favourite of all is in the blooms of the bloody cranesbill. It is intriguing that botanists used body parts to invoke its hue while the makers of matte lipstick call the same shade “pink peony”. Look closely at the petals and they comprise fields of exquisite magenta veined with red. Continue reading...

Policy Exchange says EU agricultural policy should be replaced by system that makes imported meat cheaper for consumersBritain should abandon tariffs on American and Argentinian meat products after Brexit to bring consumer food prices down, according to a leading rightwing thinktank.Policy Exchange said the UK should phase out tariffs on agricultural products, saying they raise prices and complicate trade deals, although critics say that would pave the way for hormone-treated beef or chlorine-washed chickens, currently banned under EU law, to reach British supermarket shelves. Continue reading...

Rising temperatures and the resultant stress on India’s agricultural sector may have contributed to increase in suicides over the past 30 years, research shows

Bob Dinn urges councils and mayors regulate private landlords’ restrictions on access and use of spaceThe contradictions of Friedrich Engels’ newly installed statue looking down on the private “public” space of Tony Wilson Place would not have escaped the young man living in 1840s Manchester. Privatisation of public land by stealth (The insidious creep of London’s pseudo-public land, 24 July) is subtly altering access to the city and its amenities. Ambiguous road markings and street signs confuse the public, maximising the landowners’ profits and discriminating against people with disabilities. Close to Engels’ statue a penalty notice was issued for using a blue badge on a street without road markings – notices on building hoardings apparently overruled the absence of yellow lines and the rights of the disabled. In Spinningfields £100 penalties are threatened for stopping cars anywhere, without defining what constitutes “stopping”. Local councils and elected mayors must move quickly to enforce the same regulations on private space as those in public space, make private landowners accountable, end discriminatory practices and be fully open about changing land ownership.

Defence says it became aware of toxic chemicals in soil and groundwater at Oakey in 2010 but Shine Lawyers allege they knew of potential risks much earlier

Summer is the peak season for attacks by the UK’s only venomous snake, the common European adder. We asked a toxicology expert for the dos and don’tsAs any six-year-old will tell you, there is only one venomous snake native to Britain: Vipera berus, AKA the common European adder. Still, it can give you a nasty bite, and doctors have warned that bite victims are walking into a world of pain by not getting help soon enough.“I’m astonished by the number of people who know they’ve been bitten but just go home,” says Michael Eddleston, a professor of clinical toxicology at the University of Edinburgh and a snake expert. “Then they wake up with massive swelling, when treatment is far less effective.” Continue reading...

Researchers find that economic, emissions and population trends point to very small chance Earth will avoid warming more than 2C by century’s endThere is only a 5% chance that the Earth will avoid warming by at least 2C come the end of the century, according to new research that paints a sobering picture of the international effort to stem dangerous climate change.

Authorities race to identify bodies as rescue workers reach new areas and fear monsoon death toll will rise furtherSevere monsoon flooding has killed 213 people in western India with officials fearing the death toll would rise as receding waters revealed additional victims.Nearly 130,000 people have been relocated to safer ground in Gujarat state after hundreds of cities and villages were devastated by weeks of torrential rain. Continue reading...

2017 is behind only El Niño-amplified 2016.

Death rates of hares native to Highlands are not monitored and animals are widely persecuted for sport, OneKind saysUnregulated culling of Scotland’s mountain hares should be banned and the species protected, according to a report that says shooting the animals for sport is inhumane and uncontrolled.

The conservation sector is dominated by white faces, and for many people it looks a bit like colonialism. It’s time for new voices to take up the fightIn a few days it will be the 18th anniversary of the death of Michael Werikhe, the enigmatic African conservationist. You don’t hear or read much of him these days.Nicknamed “the Rhino Man” because his work and campaigns focused on the critically endangered black rhino, Werikhe’s main campaign tactic of choice was walking to raise awareness. His first walk, starting on Christmas Day 1982, took him from Mombasa to the Kenyan capital Nairobi – a distance of 484 kilometres – and lasted for 27 days. He later walked in East Africa, Europe and North America to raise awareness and money, raising nearly $1m and covering nearly 5,000km. Continue reading...

Cycling can be a huge part of the fight to tackle city air pollution. Tim Burns of Sustrans explains how their Active Travel Toolbox can help us get thereThe government’s air quality plan may make our air more breathable in the long run but it fails to tackle some of the biggest issues facing cities and towns in the UK, and more people on bikes are a huge part of the answer.At the heart of the plan is a move to ban all new diesel and petrol vans and cars from 2040, alongside a range of measures to support the electric car market and retrofit existing vehicles. It remains to be seen if the plan will be an effective measure to improve air quality, but it is almost guaranteed that this will be another missed opportunity to think about how we move about and live in cities and towns. Continue reading...

The river was once biologically dead but seals are back and a population survey will help guard against threats from disease and dredging“It’s a good news story,” says zoologist Anna-Christina Cucknell, as she watches seals glide smoothly through the water, their dark eyes watchful as their heads swivel like periscopes. “In the 1950s, the Thames was declared biologically dead. But the seals are coming back.”Cucknell will lead a land, air and sea survey of the seals in the greater Thames estuary which begins on Monday, including the harbour seals she is watching in the mouth of the river Stour, a short boat trip from Ramsgate marina. Continue reading...

Venetians regularly protest against the huge cruise ships docking in the city, but mass tourism is not the only problem they bring – the toxic air they pump out is harmful to locals and visitors alikeIf you’re heading to Venice on holiday this summer, don’t forget to pack your pollution mask. Worrying about toxic air might seem strange in a city with few roads and cars, but Venice’s air carries hidden risks.Every day five or six of the world’s largest cruise ships chug into the heart of the ancient city, which hosts the Mediterranean’s largest cruise terminal. These ships advertise luxurious restaurants, vast swimming pools and exotic entertainment – but keep quiet about the hidden fumes they pump into the city’s air. Continue reading...

Epping Forest, Essex The deep carpet of moss hides a watery void, and the sparkling sundews are busy trapping insectsThe Lodge Road bog is a pool of tranquillity at the centre of the commuter-traffic hum. Both my mobile phone and walkie-talkie radio signals have died, and only a few darting dragonflies break the stillness. Sponging up the sunlight, the bog glistens, a curve of brilliant green amid the deep summer gloom cast by surrounding beeches.On the outer orbit of London, the survival of this fragile place, the most important habitat of its kind in Essex, seems astounding. Carbon-dating reveals that the first layer of vegetation was laid down here more than 4,000 years ago. Ponded back by a Neolithic trackway, or just some natural lip of gravel, the area was deepened by road building for the various incarnations of nearby Copped Hall since the middle ages. Continue reading...

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 3 August 1917A caterpillar sent to me for identification had been place in a cardboard box surrounded by corrugated paper, and marked, “Do not crush”; nevertheless, the post office had done its best, and when I unwrapped the paper no caterpillar was visible in the smashed box. I was puzzled by its absence until I noticed a hard lump on the corrugated paper; the lava, released from the box, had employed its leisure by spinning a cocoon in which to pupate. The normal cocoon of the puss moth, the species which had been sent, is placed on the trunk of a willow or poplar, and the caterpillar mixes with its sticky and quickly hardening silk particles of wood and bark, so that the finished abode looks exactly like its surroundings; the present cocoon looks like a swelling of the paper. Here was a case for the advocates of protective resemblance, correct enough in a way, yet simply caused unconsciously by the caterpillar making use of materials at hand; many similar phenomena can be explained in the same way. Continue reading...

From New Zealand to India and North America, wet weather has brought misery to tens of thousands of peopleAfter wet winter weather across New Zealand, the South Island has suffered from a deluge of flooding in the past week. Severe storms caused widespread flash flooding and landslides, which led to a state of emergency being declared across the affected areas; including Canterbury and the island’s largest city, Christchurch.In the worst affected locations, about 200mm of rain fell in only 24 hours, inundating multiple roads and buildings, with members of the armed forces being rallied to help rescue people trapped in their homes. Continue reading...

Household vehicle charging will be the equivalent of running an electric shower for hours on end, argues Colin ReadThere seems to be little understanding of the simple fact that electric vehicles (EV) are, in the main, pollution shifters – from tailpipe to power generation facility (Ban from 2040 on diesel and petrol car sales, 26 July). The electricity generation and transmission system is already tested to its limits during a harsh winter. Only if objections disappeared to the mass building of thousands of the largest wind turbines, plus similar numbers of hectares of photovoltaic solar generation, could the pollution shifters’ argument be refuted. Even then, there would still be need for conventional or nuclear generation for when the sun doesn’t shine and wind doesn’t blow – doubling the capital requirement.Then there is the transmission system. Its capacity is based on “averaging”. It assumes that not everyone will be using the full load available to their house at the same time. Each EV charging station takes minimum 3.3kW for around 12 hours – or 7.2kW for fast charging. It would be the equivalent of every house having an electric shower in service for many hours, all at the same time. The distribution system is simply not designed to cope with these simultaneous loads. If the government is serious about no new hydrocarbon-fuelled cars after 2040, we would need to start a programme of upgrades or replacement to the entire electricity distribution system. Continue reading...