Victorian woman spends two days in hospital after being stung on neck off Fitzroy IslandA female snorkeller is lucky to be alive after suffering heart failure following an Irukandji jellyfish sting in far north Queensland.The 39-year-old Victorian woman was snorkelling off Fitzroy Island last Friday when she was stung on the neck by the deadly, thumbnail-sized jellyfish. Continue reading...
The Thylacine Awareness Group is ‘dedicated to the research, recognition and conservation of our most elusive apex predator’ – officially extinct since 1936Six years ago Neil Waters moved to Tasmania. There, he says, he had a “brief encounter†with a thylacine, the carnivorous marsupial known as the Tasmanian tiger, declared extinct in 1986.Two years later, in January 2014, he was doing work on his house when a smaller animal walked up a dirt track leading out of a tin mine and past his bedroom window. Continue reading...
New analysis of nine species that ‘walk’ by night on shallow reefs shows their range is much smaller than was knownBizarre “walking sharks†are at a greater risk of extinction than previously thought, with new information about their distribution leading researchers to expect greater efforts to protect them from human threats such as fishing and climate change.Bamboo sharks include nine species of sharks that swim and “walk†in shallow waters around northern Australia, Papua New Guinea and parts of Indonesia. In 2013 a new species of the genus was found in Indonesia. Continue reading...
Parts of UK experienced coldest night of the season on Tuesday, with temperature of -9.4C (15F) recorded in Powys in WalesEngland and Wales will continue to experience some of the coldest temperatures of the last 12 months over the next few days , as the meteorological winter starts on Thursday.Related: Cold snaps: frost and ice around the UK – in pictures Continue reading...
by Frances Perraudin North of England reporter on (#23G2S)
Trees planted in memory of a school’s former pupils killed in first world war set to be cut down in road maintenance projectCampaigners are demanding that Sheffield council re-examine plans to cut down trees planted to honour soldiers killed in the first world war, in the latest development of the long-running battle over the local authority’s tree-felling programme.The 23 trees on Western Road in the Crookes area of the city were planted in memory of a group of young soldiers who attended nearby Westways primary school and were killed in the war. Continue reading...
by Eric Hilaire, captions by Tom Phillips on (#23FT8)
‘We will make China a beautiful country with blue sky, green vegetation and clear rivers,’ vowed President Xi Jinping in September. But these haunting photographs by the award-winning Canadian photojournalist Kevin Frayer, who travelled to Inner Mongolia to witness the activities of unauthorised steel mills, underline the scale of Beijing’s challenge to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels Continue reading...
UK’s two largest supermarket chains will replace the plastic stems with paper ones in all own-brand products by the end of 2017The UK’s two largest supermarket chains have committed to end the sale of cotton buds with plastic stems, which are the most common litter from toilets flushed on to the country’s beaches.Both Tesco and Sainsbury’s will replace the plastic stick with paper by the end of 2017 in their own-brand products. Continue reading...
by Asaf Shalev, Michael Phillis, Elah Feder and Susan on (#23FKS)
Exclusive: an agency inside the Obama administration poured billions into fossil fuel projects that will lead to global carbon emissions on a damaging scale
by Oliver Milman, Chris Phillips and Valerie Lapinski on (#23FKR)
Barack Obama has been called the first ‘climate president’ for acknowledging the real threat of global warming. But work by Columbia University and the Guardian shows that Obama’s climate record has been badly tarnished by investments made in dirty fuels around the world
Plan to cut energy use by 30% before 2030 forms centrepiece of package to help EU meet its Paris climate commitmentsEurope will begin phasing out coal subsidies and cut its energy use by 30% before the end of the next decade, under a major clean energy package announced in Brussels on Wednesday.The 1,000 page blueprint to help the EU meet its Paris climate commitments also proposes measures to cut household electricity bills, integrate renewables into power markets, and limit use of unsustainable bioenergy. Continue reading...
by Joe Whittle at the Oceti Sakowin camp, North Dakot on (#23FDT)
As an Indigenous American, Joe Whittle never questioned his need to travel to Standing Rock. The resolve he saw to protect a sacred space was transformativeAs an Indigenous American, there was never any question of whether I should travel to Standing Rock or not. I needed to witness firsthand what was happening there, and wanted to offer solidarity to those fighting for the right of tribes to exercise agency over their own futures.Only one problem remained: I had to find a way to go. Continue reading...
by Athlyn Cathcart-Keays in Copenhagen on (#23EXW)
Denmark’s capital has reached a milestone in its journey to become a cycling city – there are now more bikes than cars on the streets. Can other cities follow?Bicycle sensors in Copenhagen clocked a new record this month: there are now more bikes than cars in the heart of the city. In the last year, 35,080 more bikes have joined the daily roll, bringing the total number to 265,700, compared with 252,600 cars.Copenhagen municipality has been carrying out manual traffic counts at a number of city centre locations since 1970, when there were 351,133 cars and 100,071 bikes. In 2009, the city installed its first electric bike counter by city hall, with 20 now monitoring traffic across the city. Continue reading...
Many of his staffers are from an opaque corporate misinformation network. We must understand this if we are to have any hope of fighting back against themYes, Donald Trump’s politics are incoherent. But those who surround him know just what they want, and his lack of clarity enhances their power. To understand what is coming, we need to understand who they are. I know all too well, because I have spent the past 15 years fighting them.Related: Trump’s climate denial is just one of the forces that point towards war | George Monbiot Continue reading...
Gunnislake, Tamar Valley Barges that carried coal, corn, manure, granite, bricks and lime had to be hauled manually upstream against the currentFrom the hilltop railway station, rain clouds veil sight of Dartmoor and, in nearby Stony Lane, run-off flows between shoals of sodden beech leaves. Down this sunken way towards the river, ferns, mosses and pennywort show green under the tangle of fading bramble, yellow-leafed hazel and bare sycamore; the enclosing hedge-banks frame occasional glimpses across the valley where steep woodland engulfs river-cliffs and pinnacles like Chimney Rock.Sound of water roaring over the weir carries uphill and becomes even louder below Hatches Green, where tennis court and football pitch in King George’s Field are overlooked by the orange and dark green deciduous and coniferous woods opposite – once part of the Duke of Bedford’s estate. Continue reading...
Amnesty claims producer Wilmar employs children to do back-breaking physical labour on refineries in IndonesiaGlobal firms behind popular brands such as Kit Kat, Colgate toothpaste and Dove cosmetics use palm oil produced by child workers in dangerous conditions, Amnesty International has claimed.The human rights organisation traced a range of well-known products back to the palm oil company Wilmar, which it alleged employs children to do back-breaking physical labour on refineries in Indonesia. Continue reading...
Is a cost-neutral shift to renewables too good to be true? Energy minister Mark Bailey is ready to take on anyone who says he can’t get to 50-50 without steep price risesIt seemed impossibly good news for the Queensland government in its push to transform Australia’s biggest carbon-polluting state into a renewable energy powerhouse in little more than a decade.An expert advisory panel steeped in what the energy minister, Mark Bailey, described as “hard-nosed economic experience and extensive modelling†last month concluded the state could effectively have its cake and eat it in its pursuit of a greener energy sector. Continue reading...
Many state schools struggling to help disadvantaged pupils (Report, 22 November) are facing a further demand on their shrinking budgets. Prudent schools that have invested in solar panels to reduce their electricity bills now face a retrospective six- to eight-fold hike in their tax rates, if the government gets its way. This would be socially divisive, as it will apply to state schools but not to the private schools that have charitable status. The higher rates will also apply to businesses and other organisations that use solar electricity internally. This is yet another blow to the solar industry, already reeling from four separate subsidy cuts since May 2015. UK solar had been expanding exponentially, creating many new jobs and reducing both the wholesale price of electricity and our carbon emissions.
Exclusive: ‘Confidential’ draft acknowledges coral bleaching but does not make any attempt to address climate changeThe Australian government’s official “response plan†to the worst ever bleaching event on the Great Barrier Reef commits it to no new action, pledges no new money and does not make any attempt to address climate change, according to a draft seen by the Guardian.The Northern Great Barrier Reef Response Plan, marked “draft†and “confidentialâ€, begins by describing the bleaching event as “the worst ever coral bleaching†and attributes its cause to climate change. Continue reading...
Timelapse footage shows the construction of a steel shelter designed to prevent radiation leaks from the site of reactor No 4 at Chernobyl. The series of videos captures the shelter’s progression over several years up to its placement on Tuesday. High radiation levels near the reactor meant parts had to be assembled several hundred metres away and then slid slowly into place
It isn’t a great surprise to learn that a director of Greece’s Public Power Corporation believes in exemptions for lignite – an especially polluting type of coal burnt at Greek power plants (Letters, theguardian.com, 24 November). However, the claim that Greece is “among the best performers in emission reductions†must not go unchallenged.In a recent report, Lifting Europe’s Dark Cloud: How cutting coal saves lives, we revealed how Greek lignite plants, responsible for hundreds of premature deaths and thousands of cases of respiratory illness every year, have in fact been granted special exemptions to EU limits set in the industrial emissions directive. As a result, when it comes to emissions of sulphur dioxide (SO), nitrous oxides (NO), dust and mercury, Greek plants are undoubtedly among the worst performers in Europe. Continue reading...
Ukraine plant reactor, scene of worst nuclear accident in history in 1986, covered with airtight structure after years of workReactor No 4 at Chernobyl, the scene of the worst nuclear accident in history, has been enclosed by a vast steel shelter designed to prevent radiation leaks from the site.The structure covers the reactor and the unstable “sarcophagusâ€, which was hastily built around it by Soviet authorities in the immediate aftermath of the disaster 30 years ago. The shelter is said to be the largest land-based movable object ever constructed. It took several years to build and cost more than €1.5bn (£1.27bn). Continue reading...
Urgent climate action must be taken and communities are willing to participate in their own electricity production – if the incentives are rightThe challenge of climate change is global and it demands action on an international scale, such as the Paris Agreement. But a large part of the solution will be local, involving all of us in the way energy is produced and consumed.
Labourers in deprived region complain of poor conditions and say multinational has blocked efforts to form a trade union, allegations denied by FyffesThousands of miles from the supermarkets in the west that they supply with cantaloupes, a community of Honduran melon plantation labourers say they are threatened with dismissal and destitution because they have tried to form a union at their Irish-owned company.The workers – the vast majority of whom are women – are now appealing to US and European consumers to boycott products sold by the fruit multinational Fyffes until it improves working conditions and allows collective bargaining.
High-carbon infrastructures lock planet into irreversible greenhouse gas emissions, says campaign groupBy the end of this decade it may be too late to limit global warming to scientifically guided limits, if the infrastructure built in the next four years is constructed along the same lines as currently planned.
by Jess Gormley Pablo Ganguli and Tomas Auksas on (#23B0N)
An extract from Liberatum’s documentary In this Climate, in which a range of cultural and environmental figures including Noam Chomsky, David Attenborough and Mark Ruffalo respond to the threat of climate change and to the deniers. The full-length film is scheduled for release before the World Economic Forum in January 2017
Coffee production supports 600,000 Kenyan farmers but their livelihoods are being threatened by a spate of robberiesMartin Kamai, a coffee farmer in rural Kenya, was sound asleep when the thieves broke into his warehouse. The 20 armed men jumped the gate, tied up the security guards and escaped with 100 bags of coffee beans – all of Kamai’s harvest.
India wants to encourage more privately owned, small-scale hydropower projects to cut its climate emissions, but questions about environmental impacts remainIn the western Himalayas, the entire village of Hamal is powered by a small hydroelectric plant on the edge of the Shalvi river. It produces enough power to light up 100 homes at a time, ending the village’s once-endemic power cuts.
Gomez the last of the rare pygmy marmosets to be returned to Symbio wildlife park after he was left in a box on a vet’s doorstepA rare miniature monkey has been reunited with its primate family south of Sydney after the group was kidnapped from a New South Wales zoo on Friday night.Ten-year-old Gomez was the last of three pygmy marmosets to be returned to the Symbio wildlife park at Helensburgh after the theft. Continue reading...
Anti-Adani faction among Wangan and Jagalingou people argue supporters of huge Carmichael mine should not be recognised as representativesTraditional owners who took discreet payments of $4,000 each to meet Adani and revive a land use deal for the Carmichael mine should be axed as representatives of their group, it will be argued in the federal court.The case stems from a split within the Indigenous group whose consent is crucial for the planned $16bn mine in Queensland’s Galilee basin to go ahead. Continue reading...
We’ve tied all sorts of ills to a failure to sit down to a hearty breakfast. But research and history show that skipping our granola bowl does not, in fact, harm our healthUntil very recently, common wisdom held that breakfast was the most important meal of the day. We’ve anecdotally tied all sorts of ills to a failure to sit down to a “complete breakfast.†But health research has proven that skipping that fried egg or bowl of cereal does not, in fact, lead to weight gain, health issues or underperformance.Our reverence for breakfast is actually relatively recent. Before the late 19th century in the US, breakfast didn’t have any particular importance ascribed to it. But all that was changed by a small group of religious fanatics and lobbyists for cereal and bacon companies. Continue reading...
Higher sea temperatures have led to the worst bleaching event on record, new study finds, with coral predicted to take up to 15 years to recoverA new study has found that higher water temperatures have ravaged the Great Barrier Reef, causing the worst coral bleaching recorded by scientists.In the worst-affected area, 67% of a 700km swath in the north of the reef lost its shallow-water corals over the past eight to nine months, the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies based at James Cook University study found. Continue reading...
Five people have so far been arrested in bitter battle, with Nick Clegg criticising the police for detaining peaceful protestersIt was, said Nick Clegg, “something you’d expect to see in Putin’s Russia, rather than a Sheffield suburbâ€. Council contractors and police had descended on a particularly desirable street in his Hallam constituency under the cover of darkness, “dragged†people out of bed to move their cars and detained peaceful protesters – “all to chop down eight treesâ€, he wrote in a local paper.So far five people have been arrested in relation to a long-running and increasingly bitter battle over the fate of Sheffield’s trees, including a 70-year old emeritus professor and a 71-year-old retired teacher, both women. On Thursday two men will become the first of the city’s tree protesters to appear in court, charged under trade union legislation, following a protest on 2 November. Continue reading...
America’s surprise election is like water on the garden of activism. We stand in solidarity with all those who seek to protect the planet and nurture hopeThis past Thursday was Thanksgiving. A time when we remember a feast, the first Thanksgiving, on Plymouth plantation in the autumn of 1621. The tales of pilgrims from the Mayflower who celebrated the harvest, shared and broke bread with the first Americans, are still used as inspiration and shared with children, teaching them the beauty of gratitude.But it is now widely understood this Thanksgiving story is a fictional history. It was invented to whitewash the vicious genocide wrought upon the native inhabitants of this magnificent continent. Not only did the Europeans try to eradicate native populations, but they made every effort to eviscerate their culture, their language and eliminate them from these coveted lands. Continue reading...
The short answer is no (Is this a war on trees? Notebook, 22 November). As a several decades-long member of the Woodland Trust, I value mature trees and the recreation of ancient woodland, but in respect to Sheffield’s tree-culling, Patrick Barkham has given only a one-sided story, that of the “save all trees†fanatics who forced the council’s hand. In our leafy suburbs many of the trees are over 100 years old and, yes, they do add many benefits to the environment. However, many are huge, forest varieties, unsuitable for the streets in which they were planted. Thus some obstruct pavements and roadways, and their roots have caused ground upheavals of 20cm or more. Some are also reaching old age, with a consequent risk of falling branches.Looking at the wider picture, it thus makes very good sense to cut these down and replant with more suitable varieties as part of the road and pavement renewal scheme, to avoid later more expensive replacement after they have damaged the new roads and pavements. I will be sad to see them go – it’s only a selected few – but very glad to get rid of the potholed roads and lumpy pavements with their tripping hazards. And my children will benefit from the new trees as they mature, as part of a planned tree-management scheme.
Alongside her husband, Doug, Kris McDivitt Tompkins bought up vast swaths of Patagonia to save it from developers. Now, a year after Doug’s sudden death, she explains how their shared vision is close to realityShe was young, spirited and rich. It was the 1970s and Kris McDivitt seemed to come straight from California central casting; the glamorous ski-racing daughter of an oil-industry man who made her fortune as the first CEO of what was to become the billion-dollar outdoor clothing company Patagonia.And then in 1993, aged 43, Kris McDivitt unexpectedly fell in love with Doug Tompkins, the adventure-junkie rock-climber and deep green environmentalist who had co-founded not one but two giant outdoor-clothing companies, North Face and Esprit. Continue reading...
Freshwater fish are out of sight and out of mind for most of the British public. And so are the dedicated band of fishery scientists who look after a resource that indicates the health of our rivers and lakes, and supports angling. Such an individual was my friend John Gregory, who has died aged 67, after a lifelong career in fisheries management.John was born in Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire. His father, Tom, was an engineer at Rolls-Royce in Derby and his mother, Jenny, worked in the local hospital. After graduating in biological sciences from the University of East Anglia, and getting married to Lynden Stratten in 1971, John spent two years as a fisheries officer in the Solomon Islands. Continue reading...
Leaked documents reveal EU pledge to carry out tests deleted from draft as governments come under pressure from carmakersPlans for independent checks of how much pollution new cars emit are being killed off by EU member states, according to leaked documents seen by the Guardian.After the Dieselgate scandal, the European commission proposed empowering its respected science wing, the Joint Research Centre, to inspect vehicles separately from national authorities, which are paid by the car manufacturers they regulate. Continue reading...
Wolf attacks on animals in region around Spanish capital up from 91 to 209 in a year, prompting rise in reimbursement budgetMadrid’s regional government is to double its compensation fund for farmers who lose animals to wolves after a steep increase in fatal attacks in the last year.
by Jan Rocha for Climate News Network, part of the Gu on (#2379G)
Climate News Network: Three main dams supplying water to La Paz and El Alto are no longer fed by Andean glaciers and have nearly run dryThe government of Bolivia, a landlocked country in the heart of South America, has been forced to declare a state of emergency as it faces its worst drought for at least 25 years.Much of the water supply to La Paz, the highest capital city in the world, and the neighbouring El Alto, Bolivia’s second largest city, comes from the glaciers in the surrounding Andean mountains. Continue reading...
Carbon Tracker says many plants running at overcapacity but China reluctant to wean itself off coal, fearing unemployment and unrestChina could waste as much as half a trillion dollars on unnecessary new coal-fired power stations, a climate campaign group has said, arguing that the world’s top carbon polluter already has more than enough such facilities.
Coal-fired power plants should be closed in orderly fashion to ensure energy supply is not disruptedA Senate report has recommended that Australia should move completely away from coal-generated electricity, citing economic factors as the primary drivers.It comes about a month after the unplanned closure of Hazelwood, Australia’s dirtiest coal station, and before the expected unplanned closure of several others around the country. Continue reading...
Stamford, Lincolnshire Rock you grasp, fighting its cold indifference. Trees you take hold of, hoist yourself into, embrace, balance onAt the end of last winter I noticed this tree: a slim, high horse chestnut on the edge of my town. In summer its leaves gave it an hourglass shape. September ignited it. October, I showed my daughter its spiky conker capsules and the flawless autumn-shine of what was inside. In November’s first weeks I saw more of the sky through its branches each visit, its presence emaciating, the clarity of its skeleton crisping with every wintering day. Continue reading...
Miniature monkeys at Symbio wildlife park in Helensburgh, south of Sydney. Three pygmy marmosets, including one that was only four weeks old, were stolen late last week. Two Sydney brothers have pleaded guilty to transporting and intending to sell them. Two of the three monkeys have been recovered but a third, 10-year-old Gomez, is still missing• Sydney brothers plead guilty over theft of rare miniature monkeys Continue reading...
Ta’u island in American Samoa will rely on solar panels and Tesla batteries as it does away with diesel generatorsA remote tropical island has catapulted itself headlong into the future by ditching diesel and powering all homes and businesses with the scorching South Pacific sun.Using more than 5,000 solar panels and 60 Tesla power packs the tiny island of Ta’u in American Samoa is now entirely self-sufficient for its electricity supply – though the process of converting has been tough and pitted with delays.