Environment | The Guardian

Nonprofit released confidential decision in complex case involving monarch butterflies, scientific freedom and the safety of the nation’s food supplyFederal officials have rejected a complaint by an entomologist who charged that the government has tried to suppress negative research findings about a widely used pesticide, in a complex case involving monarch butterflies, scientific freedom and the safety of the nation’s food supply.The confidential decision by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) was disclosed Monday by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (Peer), a nonprofit group that offers aid and advice to whistleblowers and scientists. Continue reading...

A dog-walking friend described how, having set off from the bottom of the downs in Sussex in thick mist and dressed for the freezing temperatures, he found himself in bright sunshine as he walked uphill.By the time he had reached the hilltop, he had to remove a couple of layers of clothing because the temperature had risen to 12C (54F). Continue reading...

The animals are being slaughtered – yet other European nations are able to live alongside lupines. It seems hunters don’t want to give up their total control of the countrysideThere’s been a massacre in Finland. The country, which from afar looks to epitomise sustainable living, has slaughtered a third of its wolves this winter. Seventy-five wolves have been killed since the end of August: 43 in a government-sanctioned cull, and most of the rest under a licence system that allows “problem” wolves – those repeatedly found in villages or menacing farm livestock – to be shot dead.Related: Finland approves wolf hunt in trial cull Continue reading...

The Oscar-winning actor’s environmental activism may not quite stretch back to What’s Eating Gilbert Grape but he has steadily schooled himself on the oceans and climate change since the 1990sLeonardo DiCaprio was a climate champion long before the actor wrapped himself in an animal carcass, vomited up raw bison liver, and risked hypothermia for his Oscar-winning role in Revenant.DiCaprio used his acceptance speech for best actor to urge a global audience to reject the “politics of greed”, and support leaders willing to take action against climate change. Continue reading...

The city of Salem is firing its goat squad tasked with eradicating invasive species after the animals ate the native vegetation, tooAn Oregon city’s experiment to outsource the removal of invasive vegetation to goats has backfired after the hoofed animals went on a damaging rampage.

We were saddened, but not surprised, to read that, according to a BBC Gardeners’ World survey, almost half of British people have never seen a hedgehog in their garden (Report, 29 February). The population has declined by a third in urban areas and by half in rural ones since 2000 (State of Britain’s Hedgehogs 2015 report).A big part of the problem is connectivity. If a hedgehog cannot get into your garden, you are unlikely to see one there. The British Hedgehog Preservation Society and the People’s Trust for Endangered Species have joined forces on a project called Hedgehog Street that is calling for homeowners to ensure there are 13cm x 13cm gaps at the bottom of boundary fences and walls to enable hedgehogs to move through the landscape. We have recruited almost 38,000 “hedgehog champions” to date who help to spread the word. To find out more visit www.hedgehogstreet.org. Continue reading...

Filmmaker Ryan Coogler, comedian Hannibal Buress and at least a dozen other performers were also at an event in Michigan at the same time as the Oscars“The truth is, that by and large, the world’s most popular and talented entertainers often come from the Flints all over this country,” said Grey’s Anatomy star/activist Jesse Williams. Williams was in Flint, Michigan, Sunday night with filmmaker Ryan Coogler, comedian Hannibal Buress and at least a dozen other performers, who traveled to the Rust Belt city to express solidarity with residents in the wake of a water crisis and to raise money at a #JusticeForFlint event.The show was the same evening as the Academy Awards, which were under scrutiny for a lack of black nominees. Coogler, the writer and director of feature films including Fruitvale Station and Creed, insisted days before the show that despite the scheduling, the event was not a response to the awards show. The goal, he said, was to give residents a good show, and “humanize the issue” so viewers watching the show on a live internet feed could hear about what residents are going through. Continue reading...

Note from the European commission reveals emissions trading system allowance numbers are not in line with global 2C targetThe EU is set to emit 2bn tonnes more CO2 than it promised at the Paris climate talks, threatening an agreement to cap global warming at 2C, a note from the European commission has revealed.Carbon prices will rise too slowly to cut industrial emissions as much as needed, says a confidential note prepared for MEPs on the environment committee, which the Guardian has seen. Continue reading...

Rick Snyder previously said he became aware of severity of the lead problem on 1 October, but emails show he initially aimed to avoid a disaster declarationMichigan governor Rick Snyder could have declared a federal disaster over the Flint water crisis months before he did, but instead acknowledged to his aides that he wanted to resolve the problem without a disaster declaration, according to emails released by his office on Saturday.

Finance minister Arun Jaitley imposes levy of up to 4% on new passenger vehicles as part of his annual union budgetIndia has introduced a new tax on car sales aimed at helping fight high levels of air pollution and congestion.The surprise move, announced by the finance minister, Arun Jaitley, is a victory for campaigners and a defeat for the powerful car industry. Continue reading...

From how mountains are formed to the ‘fatal attraction’ of Everest, our lesson resources will help you scale new heights with your studentsThere’s something about mountains, isn’t there? They’re massive, yes, but there’s more to it than that: they remind us small humans of our place in geological processes that happened over millions of years. Or maybe it is mainly the massiveness. Either way, mountains are great. And some of the greatest of them can be found in the Himalayas, the 1,500-mile mountain range that has nine of the world’s 10 highest peaks, including Mount Everest. As well as vital reflections on climate change and previously undiscovered species, the Himalayas also offer opportunities for learning across the curriculum. Here’s how you can scale new heights with your classes. Continue reading...

Washing infected frogs in an anti-fungal drug bath reduced mortality rate and extended lifespan of population, and could buy valuable time to save species from extinction, research showsScientists have for the first time found a successful short-term treatment for amphibians infected with a deadly fungus in the wild.Although the treatment would not save them from being reinfected and dying at a later date, it could “greatly extend” the time needed to save an amphibian population from extinction in the face of epidemic disease, according to the study led by scientists from the Zoological Society of London and published in the journal Biological Conservation. Continue reading...

The Academy Award ceremony saw a plethora of principled statements from the winners’ podium – with more than #OscarsSoWhite in their sightsMaking a political statement at the Oscars podium appears to have come back into fashion, after Leonardo DiCaprio’s Oscar-acceptance speech exhorting action over climate change led a string of wide-ranging statements at the 2016 ceremony – even if the expected controversy over Hollywood diversity was more muted than had been anticipated.The campaigning period, which had officially been kicked off by the nominations announcement on 14 January, had been dominated by talk of boycotts over the film industry’s diversity issues, and the associated #OscarsSoWhite hashtag. High profile figures such as Will and Jada Pinkett Smith chose to stay away, while up-and-coming directors Ava DuVernay and Ryan Coogler opted to attend a benefit even for the #JusticeForFlint campaign, over the water contamination crisis in Flint, Michigan. Oscars host Chris Rock tackled the issue with a stream of gags, but the combative mood was blunted by the appearance of Fox News commentator Stacey Dash – a high profile critic of Black History Month – and a less-than-incendiary speech from musician Quincy Jones. Continue reading...

Five years in planning and due to be finished in early March, more than 23,000 solar panels will be floated on the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir near Heathrow and used to generate power for local water treatment plantsOn a vast manmade lake on the outskirts of London, work is nearing completion on what will soon be Europe’s largest floating solar power farm – and will briefly be the world’s biggest.But few are likely to see the 23,000 solar panels on the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir at Walton-on-Thames, which is invisible to all but Heathrow passengers and a few flats in neighbouring estates. Continue reading...

Coal use fell 3.7% in 2015, following 2.9% drop in 2014, as China tries to wean itself off fuel that causes local air pollution problems and global warmingChina’s coal consumption fell for the second year in a row, government data showed Monday, as the world’s biggest polluter attempts to tackle chronic pollution that accompanied economic growth.

The crash in crude oil prices has huge implications for geopolitics, climate change – and even our pensionsIt’s been many years since the motorist had such a warm feeling at the petrol pump. Whoever thought they would be able to fill the car at prices as low as 90p a litre? Take advantage; fill up that tank. But don’t delude yourself that this is an unalloyed benefit. Instead be aware of the dynamic that has delivered cheap petrol to your tank, and of its serious implications.How did we get here? Since June 2014, the price of crude oil has fallen by over 70%. The reason is supply and demand, and the economics of oil markets. From the start of the Arab spring uprisings in Tunisia in January 2011, oil producers in the Middle East and north Africa sought higher oil revenues to keep people off the streets and out of the squares. That required higher oil prices – which for some time they managed to achieve. From 2011 to June 2014, prices averaged at $97 a barrel. The shale gas revolution in the US also had an impact. Production there increased by almost 5m barrels a day between 2008 and 2015 – unprecedented in the history of the industry. You don’t need a Nobel prize to realise that high prices in a market so oversupplied with oil were simply unsustainable. Continue reading...

New doc Land Of Hope And Glory - British Country Life looks behind the bucolic splendour of the magazine and its readers. But there are simmering tensions under those giletsAnd so to an alien world that lives side-by-side with our own, where people speak in accents so plummy they sound like they’re in a specialised and intense course of speech therapy, where men legitimately wear bowler hats, and the women use the word “jolly” without irony. That world is the countryside, of course, the beautiful British countryside. And that’s what Land Of Hope And Glory – British Country Life (Friday, 9pm, BBC2) is all about: our nation’s privileged green patches, the bodywarmer-wrapped people who trot about on them, and the staff who fetishise all this at Country Life magazine.At its core, Land Of Hope And Glory is similar to the Beeb’s Inside Tatler series but with very, very little about the actual production of the magazine itself. Instead the doc zips around the UK, alternately meeting too-posh-to-be-real readers, the salt-of-the-earth farmer types who work for them, and the occasional Country Life journo looking around a massive house and saying “extraordinary”. Then it’s back to the offices in south London, where longstanding editor-in-chief Mark Hedges holds the bridge of his nose and agonises over which particular Oxbridge graduate should be featured in its Girls In Pearls frontispiece. Continue reading...

First criminal action to be taken after 2011 disaster, in which three nuclear reactors went into meltdown after earthquakeThree former executives from Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) have been charged with contributing to deaths and injuries stemming from the triple meltdown in 2011 at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.Their indictment on Monday marks the start of the first criminal action to be taken in connection with the disaster, which forced the evacuation of 160,000 residents, many of whom are still unable to return to their homes. Continue reading...

Leonardo DiCaprio has won an Academy Award for best actor for his role as a betrayed 19th century frontiersman in The Revenant. The nomination was DiCaprio’s fifth in an acting capacity but it is the first time he has won an Oscar. The actor used his acceptance speech to warn about the effects of global warming, saying “Let us not take this planet for granted. I do not take this night for granted” Continue reading...

With its serious pollution problem and notorious driving styles, Milan is hardly renowned as a cycle-friendly city – but a radical new scheme aims to change that

Backstage at the Academy Awards, the winner of the best actor Oscar explanded on his impassioned acceptance speechLeonardo DiCaprio won his first Oscar on Sunday, after being nominated four times previously. The actor was expected to win after dominating the best actor race all season, winning a number of precursor awards including a Bafta. Still, he said the industry-wide support he’s received over the past few months “feels incredibly surreal”.Related: The best images from the Oscars 2016 – in pictures Continue reading...

Eshaness, Shetland A single raven appears from the gloom and hangs overhead, watching with naked curiosityWe abandon the car at Eshaness, outside the lighthouse swinging its torch in an endless, unstoppable arc, and head north along the cliffs.Only a few months ago, the crags were crowded with life: tens of thousands of seabirds – fulmars, gannets, arctic skuas and the aggressive bonxies, as they call great skuas locally, that will divebomb anyone who comes near their nests – but now they are long gone, all except the hardiest fulmars gone south for the winter. Continue reading...

Quirky video shows a population of ‘pollution survivors’ who have adapted by growing luxuriant nose hairFor almost every Beijing resident it will be a familiar sight which quite literally gets up their nose.Related: Airpocalypse now: China pollution reaching record levels Continue reading...

The video depicts a dystopia where people in China have adapted to the air by growing long moustaches – actually nose-taches – to filter out the smog. ‘Change air pollution before it changes you,’ says the video, which was produced by WildAid China as part of its GOBlue campaign. About one-third of China’s 1.35 billion people regularly breathe smog deemed unhealthy by the World Health Organisation. In a recent WildAid survey, more than 90% of Chinese people are concerned about air pollution. Continue reading...

Fewer than a third of Britons spotted a hedgehog in their gardens last year

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 4 march 1916As the snow melted from the middle of the broad meadow under the down, larks appeared, almost in a multitude, with one or two occasionally rising towards the sun, as if to start an early song, but soon settling again. The bird-snarer was busy taking them by the half-dozen, for it appears that there are epicures among us yet. A partner, he said, was on lower land a few miles away after plover; “a cold job, worth all the money.” As for the birds, it was a mistake that they had been created so wild.In the early morning we had one of the first of those peculiar ground mists that hide the earth and seem to lift most things feet above the surface of the land. Cattle coming from the byre appeared as if raised out of a low, white cloud; then in places where the fog cleared they sank as if dropped gently on to the grass. But the scene soon altered, for the younger heifers, gambolling and prodding with their horns, were away to the hedge shelter, sniffing and tossing the hay fodder thrown there in heaps for them. The birds delighted in their company, or perhaps it was the breakfast which attracted them in the hay seeds. Yellow-hammers, a stray wagtail, three or four pairs of chaffinches, a titmouse, most of them chirping or singing, and then - the sun shooting a beam of warm light on to the small green shoots of the thorn and the straggling bramble - all gave us a promise, if no more, of spring. Continue reading...

The Tory government’s plans to reduce the funding for pharmacies by 6% from October has had little publicity in the media. Pharmacies are an essential part of the NHS and the local community, and this cut is predicted to lead to the closure of one in four of them. A petition to oppose the cuts, which requires 100,000 votes for a parliamentary debate, can be found online at https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/116943

Former international development secretary Andrew Mitchell speaks for Africa’s 1 billion people when he writes “the world is moving to a freer trading regime, protectionism is declining and discredited” (A plea to fellow Tories: let’s not relive the Maastricht years, 22 February). No continent is more desperate for a freer trading regime than Africa. Yet, despite their rhetoric about supporting Africa, no other continental bloc administers a more comprehensive trade protection against Africa than the European Union.The EU common agriculture policy enables, if not compels, EU farmers to dump their excess but cheap farm produce on African markets, thus forcing African farmers to sell their products at a loss or leave the market altogether. And, while pushing for ever more foreign aid to Africa, the EU also imposes stiff tariffs on African agricultural imports, thus making it impossible for Africa to trade itself out of poverty. The result is the vicious cycle of poverty, war, famine, diseases and refugee exodus we are witnessing today. Last year alone, some 5,000 African men, women and children lost their lives in the Mediterranean trying to come to Europe in search of a better life. Granted, corruption and human rights abuse are additional push factors. But this scale of human tragedies was unheard of before the trading European Economic Community became the superstate which is the EU. Continue reading...

Measures to save 10m tonnes of CO emissions per year have been delayed amid concerns highlighted by ‘toastergate’The EU has put plans to regulate inefficient kettles and toasters into cold storage amid fears in Brussels that they could galvanise support for the leave campaign in the UK’s 23 June referendum.Mobile phones, lifts, hair- and hand-dryers and vending machines are also on a shortlist of products for increased regulation in 2015-17. The measures had been expected to save the equivalent of 10m tonnes of CO emissions per year by 2030, helping EU countries to meet efficiency goals and consumers to cut their energy bills. Continue reading...

OSVehicle hopes Tabby Evo electric car, which can be built in an hour, will be embraced by aid agencies and universities, among others

Lobbying group has been on wrong side of carbon debate for far too long, so should we really believe that this is more than just words?The decision by Britain’s most powerful energy lobby group to take a positive stance on building a low-carbon economy is a significant moment.It gives major impetus to the green agenda just as it is being undermined by influential sceptics inside the Conservative party, Treasury and Department of Energy and Climate Change. Continue reading...

Energy UK, which represents big six providers, says it now supports phasing out coal-fired stations, after years of defending use of fossil fuelsThe UK’s biggest energy lobbying group has shifted its position on green energy and will start campaigning for low-carbon alternatives for the first time, in what environmental campaigners are describing as a watershed moment.Lawrence Slade, the chief executive of Energy UK, which represents the big six providers and has been regarded as a defender of fossil fuels, said the shift was urgent in order not to be left behind. Continue reading...

In just three years the rate of clearing will create enough additional carbon dioxide emissions to cancel out emissions savings the government says it will make by paying farmers $670m to stop cutting down treesA land-clearing surge in Queensland is set to create additional carbon dioxide emissions in just three years that are equivalent to those the federal government claims it is avoiding by paying other farmers more than $670m to stop cutting down trees, according to a new analysis.

About 4,500 primates are in private hands in the UK – many of them suffering poor conditions. Is it time for a ban?Primate owner Laura was scanning the internet adverts for monkeys she could try to rescue when she spotted one from a man in the Cotswolds who was clearly finding caring for two common marmosets extremely difficult. This is a common problem: primates are wild animals and keeping them is complex, expensive and demanding.She contacted the man and agreed to collect the two adult monkeys – one male and one female. They had been kept in a tiny shed in his garden and were in a terrible condition. “He’d fed them almost entirely on porridge, baby food and fish fingers. When I asked if he had given them any fruit or vegetables, he remembered that he’d occasionally fed them grapes. Neither monkey had ever been seen by a vet. The male had severe dental problems and his tail was a mixture of matted hair and bald patches.” Continue reading...

The national campaign director for The Wilderness Society believes the C02 report reveals many damning findings regarding the current level of tree clearing in Australia. Lyndon Schneiders says: ‘Out of all the sectors, the land-based sector, which includes the tree clearing, is the only one where emissions are dramatically increasing.’ Schneiders believes that over the last three years the increase has reportedly been as much as 70%. Continue reading...

High-performance clothes are great for keeping you warm and dry, but can contain high levels of polluting toxinsThe wilderness nuts of old headed off on Nordic skis in sagging woollen leggings and handknitted sweaters. Modern wilderness wear is different. It’s high performance, engineered to aid air flow around the body.Some of this is clever design, but a lot is down to PFCs – perfluorinated chemicals. They repel grease and, crucially, water. It was a downer when we found out last year that fragments of plastic polymers from our clothes, especially active wear, end up as microplastic pollution in rivers and oceans. Continue reading...

Florida Fish and Wildlife officials commissioned hunters’ help to tackle thousands of invasive pythons from south-east Asia that have overrun the EvergladesSnake hunters captured 106 Burmese pythons after weeks of traipsing through the Florida Everglades, state wildlife officials announced on Saturday, along with awards for the most impressive catches.Thousands of invasive pythons from south-east Asia live and prey on native creatures in the Everglades, and Florida Fish and Wildlife officials admit that state-sanctioned hunts will not dent the reptiles’ numbers. But the officials say the two hunts since 2009 have helped draw attention to the snake crisis. Continue reading...

A bus attempts to cross a fast-flowing river in Peru as heavy rains continue to cause severe flooding and landslides in the country. Overflow from the Quilca River in the South of the country has caused wide-spread disruption, with blocked roads, power cuts and flooded hospitals. Periods of rainfall in the region have been heavy since December and the deluge is hampering clean-up operations

At our weatherboard infants’ school in the bush, the memorably severe Miss Cashman had to get us to safety when the bushfire came

Rick Snyder’s advisers suggested to stop using corrosive river and buy residents bottled water before contamination ‘gets too far out of control’, emails revealDespite concerns among advisers to Governor Rick Snyder of Michigan regarding water quality in Flint, state officials for months rebuffed suggestions to switch the city back to its previous water supply, citing cost as a primary factor, emails released by Snyder’s office on Friday showed.Advisers advocated moving Flint back to its prior drinking water source only months after the city made a fateful April 2014 switch from Lake Huron water to a local river. Following the switch, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) did not require Flint to treat the river water with anti-corrosion agents, allowing lead to leach off pipes and flow into households. Continue reading...

Trump claims he would dismantle agency but law experts say that would be nigh impossible: ‘I wouldn’t dignify it with a serious reply. Maybe “grow up”’Amid prolonged bickering with his rivals, Donald Trump outlined a fairly radical proposal during Thursday’s Republican debate: to scrap the US Environmental Protection Agency.

The insects covered over three and a half times more wintering grounds than last season, as diminishing milkweed and illegal logging has disrupted movement