Environment | The Guardian

Parts of Cumbria prepared for their third flood clean-up this month, ahead of the news that more heavy rain will fall across the county over the festive period

Colchester Winter Wonderland and Ice Rink closes as south-east and other areas experience warmest December for 55 yearsThe mildest start to December for years has seen larger sprouts than usual, early daffodils and now melting ice rinks.Colchester Winter Wonderland and Ice Rink, which opened 25 days ago but has been unable to function on six of those days, has been forced to close down. Staff have begun dismantling the site, which included fairground attractions and festive stalls. Continue reading...

Visiting Ethiopia, UK minister Nick Hurd says although government response has been impressive, relentless drought is ‘pushing millions to the brink’The UK will provide an extra £30m in aid for Ethiopia, where a prolonged drought means that more than 18 million people will need urgent relief in the next year, according to the Department for International Development (DfID).Half of the cash is earmarked for the UN’S World Food Programme to supply emergency food supplies to around 1.9 million people, while £14m will go to a pooled fund that can be accessed by UN agencies and NGOs providing emergency water and healthcare. Continue reading...

The country’s biggest agricultural insurer is working to actively reduce drought risk with a vanguard project to restore living landscapesFarmer Pieter Kruger stands smiling on a large weir built on a river in the Baviaanskloof area that provides water to South Africa’s fifth largest city. Tall and lean, he looks out over a gathering pool, delighted at the first time it has filled up enough to have the water roll over his shoes.“The actual restoration work happens here on this farm, but the benefits also flow to the users downstream, so in the long run everyone is going to benefit from this.”

This is the first time experts know of a slide of construction waste, but it fits a pattern of catastrophes that have become endemic to developing countriesThe deadly landslide that buried part of the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen beneath a tide of red mud on Monday may be a devastating new consequence of China’s urban explosion, an expert has warned.

Third flooding clean-up this month in Cumbria before arrival of yet more bad weather in run-up to Christmas

Business owners in the Cumbrian town of Appleby say they didn’t expect another flood on Tuesday just days after they finished cleaning up from Storm Desmond. Hundreds of homes were evacuated and vehicles were submerged. Elsewhere in Appleby, a pop-up shop had to be moved from the bowling green to avoid it floating down the river. Photograph: Paul Kingston/North News & Pictures

Images showing Nanjing city shrouded in a violet fug – said to be caused by a pollution spike at sunset – follow two red alerts for Beijing over toxic airPhotographs appearing to show one of China’s most famous cities shrouded in a spectacular violet mist went viral on Wednesday, as millions of citizens choked on the country’s latest bout of toxic smog.

Wenlock Edge, Shropshire The mist settles like a mood, yet these long nights and murky days are wonderfulA yew tree looms in the fog, a brooding presence hovering in space above the cliff, not of this world. One of a cluster of wild yews, old and stunted from growing out of limestone and an obstinacy that refuses to recognise time as we measure it, this tree floats free of meanings we impose. Also free and unbidden, the fog settles like a mood over the Edge. It is myopic, melancholic, a dark humour yet strangely comforting.Recent storms have shredded the last leaves from the ash trees; saplings rise like bones and the old ones bear dangles of ash keys as if a flood tide had washed them there. Even the last golden oaks in the dale have been snuffed out by gales and their skeletons form an inner architecture of the fog down there. Continue reading...

We miscalculate environmental risk: eating certain meats is about the worst thing you can do to the planetThe figures were so astounding that I refused to believe them. I found them buried in a footnote, and assumed at first that they must have been a misprint. So I checked the source, wrote to the person who first published them, and followed the citations. To my amazement, they appear to stand up.A kilogramme of beef protein reared on a British hill farm can generate the equivalent of 643kg of carbon dioxide. A kilogramme of lamb protein produced in the same place can generate 749kg. One kilo of protein from either source, in other words, causes more greenhouse gas emissions than a passenger flying from London to New York. Continue reading...

The 33-year-old man is expected to undergo surgery on Tuesday after his forearm was ripped off while vacationing at Unesco site, Fernando de NoronhaA shark ripped off a Brazilian diver’s forearm as he swam off the tropical archipelago of Fernando de Noronha, the first such attack to hit the Unesco world heritage site, authorities said on Tuesday.The 33-year-old scuba enthusiast was vacationing in the protected marine reserve off Brazil’s north-eastern coast when the shark attacked him on Monday during a diving excursion. Continue reading...

The global outcry following the brutal killing of a lion in Zimbabwe was unprecedented. But the death of Cecil raised more than $1m in donations – and has ensured the survival of his grand-cubs‘Cecil didn’t die for a reason. He died for a cause,” says Johnny Rodrigues, chair of the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force.Five months after Zimbabwe’s most famous lion was found skinned and headless on the edge of Hwange National Park, the killers have not been convicted. In October, the Zimbabwean government dropped charges against Walter Palmer, the Minnesotan dentist who paid £35,000 to hunt the lion. Meanwhile the trial of Theo Bronkhurst, the professional hunter who led the expedition, is ongoing. Continue reading...

Penalty, thought to be largest imposed on a North Sea operator, welcomed by environmental campaigners but union leaders fear it will have little impactThe French oil and gas multinational Total has been fined more than £1m for safety breaches that led to a potentially catastrophic leak at its Elgin platform in the North Sea.Total will pay £1.125m – the largest fine imposed on a North Sea operator – as well as court costs, after it was prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive, and pleading guilty at Aberdeen sheriff court. Continue reading...

Towering 200 metres above the desert, the Atacama 1 will harvest the sun’s energy from a surrounding field of giant mirrors. But the completion of the $1.1bn project, the first of its kind in Latin America, has been thrown into doubt by the financial difficulties of its Spanish ownerRising more than 200 metres above the vast, deserted plains of the Atacama desert, the second tallest building in Chile sits in such a remote location that it looks, from a distance, like the sanctuary of a reclusive prophet, a temple to ancient gods or the giant folly of a wealthy eccentric.Instead, this extraordinary structure is a solar power tower that is being built to harvest the energy of the sun via a growing field of giant mirrors that radiate out for more than a kilometre across the ground below with a geometric precision that is reminiscent of contemporary art or the stone circles of the druids. Continue reading...

After devastating coastal flooding in 2013, Stephen Baker is hoping that this Christmas Day, severe weather won’t get the better of local flood defencesOn Christmas Day, Stephen Baker will, all being well, enjoy a family Christmas lunch at his home just outside Ipswich.But there will be one intrusive presence at the meal: Baker’s Blackberry will be on the table. That’s because Baker, chief executive of two district councils, Suffolk Coastal and Waveney, is on call for the possibility of coastal floods. Continue reading...

Vandana Shiva, Hunter Lovins and other campaigners call on governments to create a global trust that would sue polluters for damaging the atmosphereIt’s not every day you hear about a group of teenagers taking on a government department in the name of climate change, but that’s exactly what happened in Washington State. What’s more, the teens won.

Climate Home: Date UN shuts book for signing Paris agreement is the moment for world to show it’s cutting carbon faster, says Dutch thinktankIn a new global warming pact, countries set out milestones over the next five years in a bid to bridge the gap between national targets and what science recommends.

Environment Agency issues flood warnings for Lake District and other areasFlood waters could return to areas of Britain that have already been devastated by Storm Desmond.

Uncharacteristically mild temperature on 22 December means Greater London most likely to beat record winter warmth of 16.1CIt could be the mildest 22 December since records began, with forecasters saying the unsettled weather sweeping across Britain could last until Christmas Eve.The uncharacteristically mild temperature on this year’s winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, means the Greater London area is the most likely to beat the record winter warmth of 16.1C set at Hoylake, Merseyside, in 1910. Continue reading...

East Allen river, Northumberland The four Scots pines are taking on the softness of dusk as I pick my way towards themThe light is already leaving the valley on this December mid-afternoon, though it lingers on the larch tops in the hillside wood to the north. Beyond that, the high fields are suffused with a rosy glow. The four Scots pines by the river are taking on the softness of dusk as I pick my way towards them through sodden rushes. A half-detached limb sweeps down to rest on the grey drystone wall and I’ve come to pick its cones in a personal annual ritual.The cones, closed and pointed, have a rough solidity under my fingers, their overlapping plates rhythmical in their Fibonacci arrangement. It takes some tugging from the springy branches to stuff my pockets. Once home, I fill a terracotta dish and set it by the wood burning stove, a small celebration of hearth and winter. By spring the tough cones will have expanded, loosening their papery seeds, which I will sow in a nursery corner of the vegetable garden. Continue reading...

A climate of fear and often appalling conditions grip workers in the UK’s chicken abattoirs and processing plantsBritain’s poultry sector is in the midst of its annual Christmas bonanza as consumers splash out on festive supplies. But as people rush to get their meat they may be unaware of a dark side to this industry. Previous investigations by the Guardian have uncovered a catalogue of alleged hygiene failings in the poultry industry. And now there are also concerns about working conditions.

One of seven Venezuelans whose boat capsized near Aruba has died after attack moments before he was to be pulled to safetyA Venezuelan man whose boat capsized off Aruba in the Caribbean has died after a shark attacked him in the middle of a rescue attempt by coastguards.The Dutch Caribbean coastguard said the man, who was one of seven Venezuelan men thrown into the sea after their boat sank, was moments from safety when the attack took place. Continue reading...

‘Obviously I screamed a little bit. The shark jumped off my board, swam off in the other direction,’ says surfer after close encounter of the marine kindA Sydney surfer has had a run in with a six-foot shark after it “jumped” on to his board at Bondi beach.Related: Shark 'eco-barrier' nets for NSW north coast to be installed after Christmas Continue reading...

Volunteers from Utyos wild animal rehabilitation centre help orphaned Himalayan black bear cubs prepare to spend their first winter on their own in a sanctuary in the far eastern Russia. Biologist, Yana Panova, explains that the bears could become endangered due to poaching. Utyos director, Eduard Kruglov, says the bears will be guided by instinct in their new environment Continue reading...

US Fish and Wildlife Service’s new restrictions will make importing lion ‘trophies’ more difficult, five months after US dentist killed famous Zimbabwean lion, CecilThe US plans to extend its endangered species protection to lions in Africa, five months after an American dentist caused an international furore by killing Cecil, a famed lion which lived in Zimbabwe.

As the state’s solar industry booms, the growth of clean energy has stirred skepticism in the tiny rural town of Woodland, population 800

Son Xanda is spotted mating as public donation for Oxford University’s lion research work in Zimbabwe crosses $1mThe son of Cecil, the lion killed by American dentist and hunter Walter Palmer in July, has been observed mating and scientists now anticipate the birth of Cecil’s grandcubs in March.“Xanda was seen mating repeatedly with lionesses from the so-called Backpans pride,” said Professor David Macdonald, founding director of Oxford University’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU), which has been researching the lions in Hwange national park, Zimbabwe, where Cecil was killed, since 1999. “Pregnancy in lions lasts about 110 days, so all being well Cecil’s grand offspring should be around in March.” Continue reading...

From relief drones to 3D-printed food and medicine, technology designers can play a vital role keeping us safe in emergenciesThe latest floods in the north-west of the country have shown the weakness of connected technology when power is lost and all digital devices and infrastructure – mobile phones, internet, transport – stop working. Can the design of digital technology, especially future and emerging innovations such as drones and 3D-printing, help in providing vital services to people affected by flooding?Related: ‘Hammering, grim, brainless’ – how Storm Desmond hit Lancaster Continue reading...

Nutrino, a new app powered by supercomputer Watson, claims to be able to guide women through pregnancy. But is it just another voice among many?Daffi is pregnant with her third child. On holiday in Thailand recently she wondered whether it was safe for her to eat prawns. She asked her new pregnancy app, which reassured her that she could go ahead and pop the prawn in her mouth.Related: Why pregnancy is a real pain in the back Continue reading...

The company responsible for the FDA-approved genetically engineered salmon says it has no plans to label the fish as such, but this is a mistake – for both the company and consumers

Smog continues to cover Beijing and Shanghai on Monday, as China’s government issues a ‘red alert’ for the capital. Factories were ordered to cut back or suspend production as levels of harmful particles hit seven times their safe limits. It is the third consecutive day Beijing has been under a toxic haze Continue reading...

Factories ordered to cut back or suspend production as levels of harmful particles hit seven times their safe limitsBeijing has ordered 2,100 factories to suspend or reduce production as part of its “red alert” measures to deal with smog, the government has said, as the city remained shrouded under a toxic haze for the third consecutive day on Monday.

Sacha Dench will brave arctic Russian temperatures to trace the migration route of Bewick’s swans to find out why their population has halved in 20 yearsA British conservationist is taking to the skies next year for a daring and uncomfortable 4,500-mile journey across the Russian Arctic to help save the UK’s smallest and shyest swan.Sacha Dench plans to use a paramotor – a kind of parachute propelled by a motor – to brave temperatures of -9C (15.8F) as she mirrors the Bewick’s swan’s yearly migration route. The swans migrate as the northern Russian winter turns inhospitable and birds travel west to Britain and other milder climes. Continue reading...

Baugh Fell, Northern Pennines ‘If bad weather is forecast, we ensure the sheep are gathered in before the blizzards break’“Aye,” says the postman, after dragging the heavy gate to one side and before driving on through. “Delivering Christmas cards to Uldale House farm can be an expedition.”Christina Rossetti’s carol In the Bleak Midwinter says it all. Drifts. Shot ice. White-outs. Though today only the frosty wind is making moan, and what in effect is an asphalted lane across a moor powdered white with snow and marked by the diamond-shaped footprints of a fox – forboding, as its bends merge into the peaty mosaic – is ice-less. Continue reading...

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 27 December 1915Mistletoe is dear this year, but holly has never been more plentiful and thickly berried. I have even seen a variant on the traditional spruce fir Christmas tree, in a magnificent young holly tree, covered with fruit. It seemed superfluous to decorate that, for it could not be made brighter. The lighting of it presented considerable difficulties, however, because the branches ran up much more nearly perpendicular than the branches of the fir, and only electric lights would be well adapted to such a form. It was possible, however, to suspend little Chinese lanterns from the branches. A good deal of our mistletoe comes from abroad, and we are on rather short commons in consequence; yet it grows very freely here, especially in orchards, and is a very charming sight on the leafless branches. The result of experiments has been to show that it will grow on nearly any tree, although it does not like resinous trees, and is not common on the oak. Perhaps it was its rarity which made the quercine mistletoe precisely the sacred plant of the Druids. Mistletoe is by no means difficult to grow from seed, though much better results are attained on young than on old hosts. The berry is squashed upon a bough in any desired position, and in a few weeks it germinates. The little roots, bright green at first, look almost like suckers attached to the bark, but they speedily pierce it and run beneath and feed upon it. A healthy tree can endure some of the parasite without injury, but an excess will cause weakness and even death, partly from exhaustion, partly from overcrowding. It is quite possible that the missel thrush or some other bird will find your berry and eat it before the seed has germinated, unless you tie a little bit of muslin loosely over it and leave it so for a few weeks. Continue reading...

Hanford Nuclear Reservation, country’s newest national park and home to the world’s first full-sized nuclear reactor, prepares for expanded crowdsThousands of people are expected next year to tour the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, home of the world’s first full-sized nuclear reactor and the most polluted US nuclear weapons production site.Related: Manhattan Project national park to preserve atomic bomb building sites Continue reading...

China is finally responding to the challenge posed by pollution, but there’s a long way to goWhen Sir Alec Douglas-Home visited Beijing in 1972, his Chinese hosts greeted the foreign secretary with a carefully crafted joke about London pea soupers. Replying, Sir Alec rather snappishly referred to the Clean Air Act of 1956, which he said had largely ended the problem. The Great Smog of 1952, which was estimated to have killed at least 4,000 Londoners, had led to a huge effort to clean up the city’s air. Beijing then was a city of bicycles, narrow alleys and small courtyards, intersected by broad boulevards on which there was virtually no motor traffic. These days, it is periodically choked by smog as thick as any which Charles Dickens recorded, while London has little visible pollution, although its levels of some dangerous particles remain unacceptably high.Beijing issued its most severe air pollution warning for the first time ever three weeks ago. Now a second “red alert”, which is expected to last until Tuesday, will keep some cars off the road, close factories and allow school authorities to cancel classes. Beijing pollution has actually been much worse on previous occasions, with the government issuing less severe warnings or none at all. Such inconsistencies and evasions have angered ordinary Chinese. The new red alert warnings may thus be intended as much to dissipate public mistrust as to physically dissipate the smog. The measures taken arguably make little difference to air quality. Rather they are intended to signal to citizens that the government wants to be seen to be dealing with a problem it has persistently denied in the past. Continue reading...

The business leaders, academics and environmentalists warning that we need a major U-turn in UK energy policy (Government ‘must change course’ after climate pact, 14 December) were clearly correct. They were focusing rightly on the need for renewables and energy conservation to meet greenhouse gas emissions targets. But it is also worth focusing on how we need many of the environmental measures that the government has cut back, delayed or abolished for economic and social reasons.George Osborne has understandably stopped talking about rebalancing the economy – given his patent failure to achieve that in five years as chancellor – but effective policies to support wind and tidal power offer design and manufacturing opportunities for British business that are currently being squandered. The rest of the world is powering ahead on renewables, and we’re being left behind. Small- and medium-sized enterprises around the country who’ve invested in training staff – and could be taking on many more apprentices to improve Britain’s skill base – for solar installation and home energy efficiency could be given a secure future by a sensible response to the feed-in tariff consultation and a recognition that housing is part of our national infrastructure and desperately needs investment. Continue reading...

It is appropriate that the Guardian had a quote from Dennis Skinner before the last shift at Kellingley colliery (Last bow for King Coal, killed by cheaper, greener options, 18 December), although I feel sure that he would leave the last word to the miners. The march on Saturday was an attempt at lasting community solidarity, which Skinner knows all about, having served the pit villages of Bolsover through the same upheaval of closures and moving to new pits to the ultimate closure of an industry and a very different and challenging world.We import cheap and cleaner coal rather than invest in clean coal technology and support for our own industry in thrall to the market. George Osborne has removed the subsidy for carbon capture and storage, while the government supports fracking beneath national parks and we seek investment from China to build a nuclear power station while they plan hundreds of coal-fired stations at home. Did our prime minister negotiate for less restrictive competition laws in Europe in order to subsidise our industries? Continue reading...

Re the study by a team of researchers at Leiden University into the effect of watching horror movies on coagulation levels in the blood (Horror is truly blood-curdling, study finds, 18 December), a much more interesting and serious research topic would be how it comes about that various languages developed terms such as “bloodcurdling”, “bloedstollend” etc, centuries before the process of blood clotting was medically and scientifically understood.