Tensions are running high in Bali, with a decision due any day on a controversial land reclamation project

Nobody’s keen to fund faecal sludge management; that’s why we need public-private partnerships to pay for our water and waste disposal Continue reading...

Once-common butterfly joins a growing list of shrinking species, suggesting climate change is having greather impact than previously thoughtA tiny but unmistakably dazzling butterfly, the small copper, suffered its worst ever year last summer according to the annual scientific survey of Britain’s butterflies.The bright ginger butterfly joins a growing band of once-common butterflies in apparently inexorable decline despite no discernible habitat loss in recent years and conservationists are warning that climate change is having a greater than expected negative impact. Continue reading...

Sinderhope, Northumberland In the mist, it’s the sounds that are most acute after months of silenceWith the rough texture of a drystone wall behind my back, I perch on a flat stone and look over the high field.I can’t see much of the valley since it’s fogged by low cloud. This sharpens my other senses and I become aware of the damp, of the smell of earth and leaves and rain-soaked grass. Continue reading...

Former Nasa researcher and father of climate change awareness says melting of ice sheets could cause ‘several meters’ rise in a century, swamping coastal citiesThe current rate of global warming could raise sea levels by “several meters” over the coming century, rendering most of the world’s coastal cities uninhabitable and helping unleash devastating storms, according to a paper published by James Hansen, the former Nasa scientist who is considered the father of modern climate change awareness.The research, published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, references past climatic conditions, recent observations and future models to warn the melting of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets will contribute to a far worse sea level increase than previously thought. Continue reading...

Former Nasa researcher and father of climate change awareness says melting of ice sheets could cause ‘several meters’ rise in a century, swamping coastal citiesThe current rate of global warming could raise sea levels by “several meters” over the coming century, rendering most of the world’s coastal cities uninhabitable and helping unleash devastating storms, according to a paper published by James Hansen, the former Nasa scientist who is considered the father of modern climate change awareness.The research, published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, references past climatic conditions, recent observations and future models to warn the melting of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets will contribute to a far worse sea level increase than previously thought. Continue reading...

World Water Day research finds 44% of coal plants, and 45% of planned coal power plants, in areas of water stressCoal power plants use enough water to supply the needs of 1 billion people and that will almost double if all the world’s planned power plants come online.Almost half the new power plants will be built in areas that are already in high water stress, a report commissioned by Greenpeace says.

Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Chad and Mozambique also fare badly as report on World Water Day highlights global water and sanitation crisisPapua New Guinea, where 60% of the population live without a safe water supply, has the poorest access to clean water in the world, according to a study released to mark World Water Day.A report on the state of the world’s water showed Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Chad and Mozambique joining Papua New Guinea in the bottom five of a table ranking countries according to the percentage of households with access to clean water. Globally, 650 million people are living without an “improved” source of drinking water, which includes public taps, protected wells, rainwater or water piped into households.

Carcasses of protected birds killed during the first weekend of Victoria’s duck hunting season to be left on the premier’s doorstepThe carcasses of protected birds gunned down during the opening weekend of Victoria’s duck hunting season will be left outside the office of the premier, Daniel Andrews, in a plea for him to stop the practice.Related: Shooting lobby calls for five-year moratorium on duck hunting rules Continue reading...

When it comes to the height of Ben Nevis (Bigger Ben: UK’s highest peak just got a little taller, 18 March), has the Ordnance Survey not heard of postglacial isostatic rebound since the last ice sheets melted? Compared with Newlyn in Cornwall, which is slightly sinking, the latest GPS measurements suggest a difference in Ordnance Datum of nearly 2mm a year, equating to about 12cm over 65 years.Such heights also depend on how the modern geoid (hypothetical sea level) is computed from freely available British Geological Survey gravity data gathered without the benefit of using local OS benchmarks measured to within the nearest cm, as even decades ago this was unaffordable. Why make such a fuss over this molehill, when anyway in Germany heights on 25k maps are usually quoted to within 10cm, with more detailed contouring in flatter areas?

Research led by Oxford Martin School finds widespread adoption of vegetarian diet would cut food-related emissions by 63% and make people healthier tooGrowing food for the world’s burgeoning population is likely to send greenhouse gas emissions over the threshold of safety, unless more is done to cut meat consumption, a new report has found.A widespread switch to vegetarianism would cut emissions by nearly two-thirds, it said. Continue reading...

State document lays out next steps for Flint but Rick Snyder does not specify what lead-testing regulations his administration will seek to strengthenMichigan governor Rick Snyder said on Monday he wants the city of Flint and the entire state to have more stringent lead-level regulations than those which federal rules require.In the long term, according to a state document laying out the next steps in Flint in four areas – water supply and infrastructure, health and human services, education and economic development – Michigan will comply with a “much higher standard”. Continue reading...

Number of UK households being helped by government to improve their energy use fell 75% since 2012, according to researchMassive cuts to programmes aimed at making homes warmer and cheaper to heat have led to a 75% fall in the number of households helped by government to become more efficient since 2012, according to new research.Improving the UK’s leaky homes, such as with loft and wall insulation and more efficient boilers, is widely acknowledged as the cheapest and fastest way to cut energy bills and also reduce the carbon emissions that drive climate change. Continue reading...

The decision of the struggling entertainment chain to end its captive breeding programme shows the power of protestAt the end of 2013, I interviewed Gabriela Cowperthwaite, the director of Blackfish, a documentary about SeaWorld keeping orcas in captivity. It had quite an impact, not least that human attractions such as US stadium rockers Heart and Willie Nelson declined to play at the theme park in Orlando.Related: Stopping SeaWorld isn't enough. The fight must now go to the open oceans | Philip Hoare Continue reading...

Researchers calculate that humans are pumping out carbon 10 times faster than at any point since the extinction of the dinosaurs

Higher temperatures in France are producing exceptional vintages but the run will come to an end if global warming continues at the current rateConnoisseurs of fine wine should be drinking a toast to global warming, according to new research.

Oscar-winner said country has ‘an opportunity to change the world’ while promoting The Revenant, which has taken the Chinese box office by stormOscar-winner Leonardo DiCaprio has said China can be a “hero” for the environmental cause while on a trip to the world’s most populous nation to promote The Revenant.Alejandro González Iñárritu’s stark and harrowing western scored a hugely impressive $33m on debut at the Chinese box office this weekend, pushing the film’s worldwide debut close to $500m. At a Beijing news conference to promote the film, DiCaprio praised China for moving towards renewable energy in order to reduce carbon emissions. Continue reading...

The marketing boss of Unilever on why consumer expectations mean brands need to lead for positive changeThere has been much talk in marketing circles over the past few years about brands with purpose, brands with meaning, brands that matter – whatever you chose to call them. In fact purpose was one of the three most used words at the Cannes Lions festival back in 2013 along with storytelling and data.What people actually mean when they talk about this can be hard to pin down. What’s key for me when thinking about how this is different to corporate social responsibility is that deep and intrinsic connection to the brand and what it stands for. Purpose must sit at the core of the brand, driving everything it does. It cannot be an add-on or something that comes and goes according to whim or budget. It’s this authenticity that consumers recognise and reward, because today’s consumers, especially millennials, can smell bullshit a mile away. Continue reading...

Belgium-sized area around northern islands of Darwin and Wolf will be off-limits for fishing in bid to conserve sharks and unique habitatEcuador has created a new marine sanctuary in the Galápagos Islands that will offer protection to the world’s greatest concentration of sharks.Some 15,000 square miles (38,000 sq km) of the waters around Darwin and Wolf - the most northern islands - will be made off limits to all fishing to conserve the sharks that congregate there and the ecosystem on which they rely. Continue reading...

Smoke from cookstoves among range of environmental factors driving rise in costly non-communicable diseases in poor countries, says Dr Maria Neira

World Meteorological Organisation says unprecedented rate of change sends a powerful message to world leaders to implement the Paris deal to cut emissionsThe “alarming” and “unprecedented” rate of climate change is “sending a powerful message to world leaders”, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) has warned.Releasing its Status of the Global Climate report, the WMO – a United Nations body – detailed the string of climate and weather records that were broken in 2015, including global temperature records, exceptional rainfall, devastating droughts, unusual cyclone activity and intense heatwaves. Continue reading...

A new £200m polar research ship being built on Merseyside will put the UK at the cutting edge of ocean research. The new ship ‘is absolutely critical to provide accurate forecasts over how our planet’s going to change over the coming centuries,’ said Dr Emily Shuckburgh from the British Antarctic Survey

Celebrations and plans to buy washing machines greeted the arrival of power in Hotasar, Rajasthan, as India’s ambitious electrification plan gathers paceWhen a government official first came to Hotasar in western India, the villagers shooed him away. He had come to tell them an engineer was on his way and the village would get its first electric light bulb within months. “Bring light? To Hotasar? It’s impossible,” they told him. Others had promised the same, but plans to electrify the village had repeatedly failed.Hotasar, a small village of about 200 people in the Rajasthani desert, is very difficult to reach. In April last year, it was one of 18,452 Indian villages without electricity. In the past few months, that number has fallen to 12,100 under a flagship programme launched by the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi. Continue reading...

Nene Valley, Cambridgeshire Unusually, there’s water underfoot, and the water in the air steals any remaining familiarityThe rain starts to fall in the early dark, and it continues all day. It’s sudden and fierce. The valley seems caught out. Water appears everywhere. The river bloats, quickens, turns brown. In the fields, filthy water bleeds up from the ground. And then, the rain stops.For two days, the water just sits, the sky appearing untidily in the ground where it shouldn’t. It looks up at itself from a big, mucky wound in the field. Continue reading...

State government calls UN recommendation ‘disappointing’ but says it would be irresponsible to ignore itPlans to allow logging inside Tasmanian world heritage forests have been abandoned after a United Nations report recommended against it.The UN also expressed concern about plans for expanded tourism in the area and called for a master plan that would detail what sorts of tourism would and wouldn’t be allowed. Continue reading...

Environment minister accused of omitting climate change as cause of bleaching after surveying death of coral in reef’s far northAustralian environment minister Greg Hunt has been accused of going silent on climate change as the cause of dying coral in the Great Barrier Reef after a bleaching alert was raised to its highest level.Hunt, who surveyed the widespread death of coral in the far north of the reef by plane on Sunday, announced plans for more monitoring and programs to tackle run-off pollution and crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks. Continue reading...

The Human League co-founder releases his Sea Inside Us All project, an 82-minute recording of familiar sounds of the seaside Continue reading...

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 21 March 1916Clinging to a swaying osier wand, now thickly studded with silver catkins, the reed bunting, black-capped and white-collared, stammers his uncertain metallic notes. Even in the height of the season his efforts are feeble; he never sounds as if he had reached beyond the learning stage: the reed bunting, though like others of his family performing persistently, is at the best a poor singer. In the wood beyond the blackbirds flute finely, the thrushes constantly change their rich notes, and the chaffinches continually repeat their cheerful songs; above the fields beyond, where a few leggy lambs are staggering after their heavy-fleeced parents, the larks are up, filling the air with music, and the wanton lapwings are calling everywhere. Yet the reed bunting’s insignificant stutter, drowned by the other birds, is another sign of spring. Although in many woods the marsh marigold buds look no further advanced than a week ago, in a few sheltered spots the golden blossoms have opened, and in at least one spot, known only to a few, the sweet violets have appeared. Even the calendar, which pays no attention to varying weather, admits that this is the end of winter. Continue reading...

Some birds perform right in front of you, as if they are auditioning for the X-Factor. Others give themselves up grudgingly, momentarily, and all too fleetingly. The jack snipe is just such a bird: an avian Greta Garbo, legendarily elusive. The epithet “jack”, incidentally, means “small”; another name for the species is “half snipe”.In half a century of birding, I can count the number of prolonged views of this little known species on the fingers of one hand. That’s because, although the jack snipe is not exactly uncommon, it stays hidden, hugging the damp earth, until you virtually tread on it. Only then will it fly – and usually not very far. Continue reading...

Canada’s Lax Kw’alaams show us how we can be saved: by loving the natural world and local living economies more than mere money and profit

Information commissioner, under pressure from FOI requests, agrees to oral hearing on documents on the nuclear power plant projectAn 18-month battle to discover the true cost to consumers of building the Hinkley Point C nuclear reactors is to come to a climax in London.

Eccentric choices dominate in quest to name royal research ship, outpacing more inspirational suggestionsThe good news for the Natural Environment Research Council’s decision to crowd-search a name for its latest polar research vessel is unprecedented public engagement in a sometimes niche area of scientific study. The bad news? Sailing due south in a vessel that sounds like it was christened by a five-year-old who has drunk three cartons of Capri-Sun.

Nuclear power project on the agenda as energy and climate change committee quizzes Vincent de Rivaz this weekThe furore surrounding the planned Hinkley Point nuclear power station in Somerset is likely to go, er, nuclear on Wednesday when MPs question the UK chief executive of EDF, the debt-laden, state-controlled French utility that is meant to be building the plant. Here are some questions for the energy and climate change committee to ask Vincent de Rivaz: Continue reading...

Sunday 20 March is World Sparrow Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness of the house sparrow and the threats facing urban birds’ environments Continue reading...

Google has celebrated the astronomical start of the season – the spring equinox – but in reality spring has been arriving weeks early for yearsGoogle has marked the first day of spring with one of its famous doodles – in this case, a charming little blobman watering a handful of lovely flowers. Google’s chap obviously doesn’t live in England, which has suffered its wettest winter in 250 years and where the daffodils definitely don’t need watering.But there’s also something curiously dated about announcing the start of spring after daffodils, crocuses and other buds of spring have been out for several months in some parts of the country. 20 March is the spring equinox which, in the astronomical system of seasons, is the first day of spring. Continue reading...

From Alaska to Australia, an unprecedented heating of planet Earth is underway with rising temperatures across huge swathes of land mass and oceansOur planet went through a dramatic change last month. Climate experts revealed that February was the warmest month in recorded history, surpassing the previous global monthly record – set in December. An unprecedented heating of our world is now under way.With the current El Niño weather event only now beginning to tail off, meteorologists believe that this year is destined to be the hottest on record, warmer even than 2015. Continue reading...

Solar-powered civic lighting could play a key role in tackling Britain’s energy crisisNot far from the House of Commons, a stone’s throw from Westminster bridge, two streetlamps will soon be erected.Paid for by Transport for London, these are no ordinary lights. According to their manufacturer, they could play a major role in tackling Britain’s energy crisis. Continue reading...