Mayor Sir Peter Soulsby is using his strong mandate and the discovery of Richard III’s remains to reverse decades of car-centric planning in this medieval cityLeicester was eviscerated in the 1960s by modernist town planners. They scythed through the medieval core of the city with two inner ring-roads, and multi-lane highways were built to provide fast access to the M1 motorway. The city, like many others, became dominated by cars: congested despite the width of the radial roads and dangerous for anybody not protected by a metal cage. Leicester was once a great English medieval city, like York, Durham or Lincoln. It has many Grade I listed buildings and, with the Jewry Wall, one of the tallest Roman structures still standing in Britain. But with its history smothered in tarmac and blocked off with concrete, Leicester became unremarkable, anodyne, an East Midlands city far from the tourist trail.This changed three years ago thanks to Leicester’s oldest economically active citizen. Dug up from beneath a council car park, King Richard III is now a welcome and valuable tourist attraction, known to locals as KRIII. Leicester is using the remains and the romance of the last Plantagenet king to push for cycleways and more pedestrianisation in the city centre, trimming some of the space previously devoted to cars. Much of the city’s transformation was planned before the timely reappearance of KRIII, but deposing King Car is much easier when you’ve got a real one to put in its place. Continue reading...

Houses not built to high standards of insulation will have to be expensively retrofitted or risk breaching national carbon targets, climate watchdog warns

The fate of 70 million people rests on what happens to the Mekong river. With world leaders meeting in Paris next week for crucial UN climate talks, John Vidal journeys down south-east Asia’s vast waterway – a place that encapsulates some of the dilemmas they must solve. He meets people struggling to deal with the impact of climate change as well as the ecological havoc created by giant dams, deforestation, coastal erosion and fast-growing cities Continue reading...

Measures announced by George Osborne reduce requirement for energy firms to install new boilers and insulation in homes of UK’s poorestGreen groups and charities have reacted with anger after the government announced cuts to the UK’s most important energy-efficiency programme, which was created to help the poorest homeowners.The move by George Osborne significantly reduces a requirement for energy companies to install new boilers and insulation. The chancellor said it would help cut homeowners’ gas and electricity bills by £30 a year. Continue reading...

Your article (Paris attacks cast shadow over climate talks, 23 November) helpfully draws attention to the different responses we have to crises. The shockingly violent events in Paris and their aftermath received almost blanket media coverage for about a week, during which we appear to have become collectively ready to sacrifice billions of pounds and who knows how many lives to a quick response (bombing Isis in Syria) which, by most rational judgments, will do more harm than good for our interests in the long term. Notwithstanding the emotional and psychological imperative to “do something”, would it not be wiser to do nothing until we know what it would be useful to do?Meanwhile, a more dangerous and sinister enemy than terrorism looms on the horizon in the form of climate change. Despite knowing about this menace for over 20 years and having developed the resources and know-how to defeat it, we have simply allowed the situation to worsen. We know the identity of the “evil masterminds” (the leaders of heavy-carbon industries) behind this ongoing atrocity which is in the process of slaughtering many millions of people and could quite conceivably wipe out civilisation. We also know the identities and whereabouts of the “terrorists” – every one of us who carries out the wishes of the masterminds by burning fossil fuel as if there was no tomorrow and neglecting to invest properly in the renewable energies that can save us. Continue reading...

National park outside Warsaw says several of the animals seem to have settled there again after government cull in the 1960sWolves have returned to a large national park on the outskirts of Warsaw, decades after they were wiped out there under a hunt launched by the communist authorities.“We’re really happy,” said Magdalena Kamińska, spokeswoman for the 150sq mile (385sq km) Kampinos national park, Poland’s second largest. “The fact that wolves have returned to our park, from which they completely disappeared in the 1960s, means that nature is in good health and is renewing itself.” Continue reading...

Radiohead frontman and environmental campaigner has spoken out about the difficulties he faced when asking politicians to acknowledge climate changeThom Yorke has claimed that advisers to Tony Blair tried to force him to meet the then prime minister in 2003.The Radiohead singer’s comments, which were made in an interview with him and Guardian columnist George Monbiot on the French online magazine Télérama, referred back to the time when he was the spokesman for the Big Ask, a climate change campaign by Friends of the Earth. Continue reading...

Radiohead frontman and environmental campaigner has spoken out about the difficulties he faced when asking politicians to acknowledge climate changeThom Yorke has claimed that advisers to Tony Blair tried to force him to meet the former prime minister in 2003.The Radiohead singer’s comments, which were made in an interview between him and Guardian columnist George Monbiot on the French online magazine Télérama, referred back to the time when he was the spokesman for the Big Ask, a climate change campaign by Friends of the Earth. Continue reading...

Africa climate business plan, emphasising clean energy, efficient farming and urban protection, will be launched by World Bank chief at Paris climate talksThe World Bank has devised a $16bn (£10.6bn) strategy designed to help Africa adapt to climate change and prevent millions of people from sliding into poverty.By fast-tracking clean energy, efficient farming and urban protection, the measures promise to greatly increase renewable energy across the continent, bolster food production and lead to the planting of billions of trees. It is also hoped that the scheme will improve life in cities and reduce poverty, migration and conflict. Continue reading...

Trials taking place in New South Wales also include hi-tech drum lines that will hook sharks and allow for them to be quickly tagged and relocatedShark-tracking drones are being deployed to protect Australia’s beachgoers following a series of attacks on surfers. Trials will begin next week as part of a strategy by the New South Wales (NSW) government, which will also see hi-tech drum lines installed to allow sharks to be hooked, tagged and released further out to sea.The drones will feed images with GPS coordinates back to operators looking for sharks, with the first field tests being conducted off Coffs Harbour, about 285 miles (380km) south of Brisbane. Continue reading...

Conservative government breaks manifesto promise on project to capture emissions from fossil fuel plants, days ahead of UN climate summit in ParisThe UK government has cancelled its £1bn competition for carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology just six months before it was due to be awarded, breaking a pledge in the Conservative party’s election manifesto.

Slowdown in 2014 is attributed to lack of growth in Chinese coal use and signals new period of slower rises in world emissions, say expertsThe growth of global carbon emissions virtually stalled last year after a decade of rising rapidly, figures published on Wednesday show, just days before world leaders meet in Paris for international talks on climate change.The slowdown in the growth of the emissions that have caused record-breaking heat in recent years was largely down to China, which bucked its trend of ever-increasing coal use, the Netherlands environment agency said. Continue reading...

Readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific conceptsSince I installed nut feeders and fatballs in my garden the birds have abandoned the seed feeders completely. Have I ruined their diet?Graham Williams, Taggs Island, Hampton, London Continue reading...

Labour leader tells PM that Britain will go to Paris climate talks with biggest gap between usage and 2020 targets of any EU countryBritain will go to the Paris climate talks with the biggest gap between current renewable energy usage and 2020 targets of any EU country, Jeremy Corbyn has said.

Ban would be effective from 2017 if industry and the African countries involved don’t improve practices, says environment ministerThe UK will ban imports of lion trophies by 2017 unless the hunting industry cleans up its act, environment minister Rory Stewart has said.The killing of Cecil the lion in Zimbabwe by a US dentist sparked an international outcry over trophy hunting this summer, leading to calls by politicians and conservationists for a ban on their import to the EU and US. Continue reading...

Failure of Spanish renewable group proves embarrassing for US investment bank, which launched share sale to raise funds for it earlier this yearA Spanish renewable energy group has collapsed into insolvency protection, it said on Wednesday, just months after US investment bank Citi led a €100m (£70m) share sale to raise funds for the group.Abengoa shares dropped 70% in minutes after the company said it was entering insolvency protection after a deal for a €350m capital injection fell through. Continue reading...

There are only three northern white rhinos after Nola was put to sleep. But it’s not just rhinos in peril – thousands of species face extinction. It doesn’t have to be this wayOn Sunday, zookeepers euthanised a 41-year-old rhino who was suffering from a painful bacterial infection at the San Diego zoo safari park. Zoo animals perish all the time – and this one died largely of old age – so why is this worthy of global news? Because the rhino, a female named Nola, represented 25% of her subspecies’ global population.The northern white rhino once roamed a large chunk of central Africa, but centuries of poaching have left the subspecies on life support. With Nola’s death, only three aging individuals survive, all under constant armed guard at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya – and all unlikely to reproduce. Continue reading...

In a relatively low-key exchange at prime minister’s questions on Wednesday, Jeremy Corbyn questions David Cameron on the government’s environment policy, including support for solar panels and wind turbines. Corbyn also asks Cameron ‘why one third of those referred to women’s refuges in England are now being turned away’

They eke out an existence in the face of myriad humanitarian, environmental and political challenges. Now people in rural Somaliland face a debilitating drought that threatens to change their way of life foreverHassan Haji Towakal has lived in one of the world’s toughest environments for 80 years. He has seen many droughts, but the recent prolonged lack of rainfall is the worst he has experienced in Somaliland, the breakaway country situated in Somalia’s relatively peaceful northern corner.The drought, which has left roughly 240,000 people without enough food and killed between 35% to 40% of Somaliland’s precious livestock, has also made Haji Towakal question the future of pastoralism – the only life he has known. Continue reading...

Touchwood in Solihull cancels event after animal rights group denounces use of at-risk Humboldt penguins as ‘entertainment’A shopping centre has cancelled a festive meet-the-penguins event after pressure from animal rights campaigners.

At recent Guardian roundtable discussion, experts talked about how the energy sector can bring down dependence on fossil fuels and reduce carbon emissionsWith the UN Conference on Climate Change (COP) in Paris just days away, a global strategy for reducing carbon emissions is tantalisingly close. Current commitments on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are due to run out in 2020 and governments are convening in Paris to agree a roadmap for what happens in the next decade and beyond. For any such agreement to work, however, it must include a transition from high-carbon, fossil-fuelled energy production, to one where power comes from clean, renewable energy.There are some indications that the energy transition is under way. The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently announced that renewable energy accounted for half of all new power plants in 2014, while large oil companies cancelled 80 drilling projects worldwide in 2015. But the IEA also calculates the world is still on course for global warming of 2.7C before the end of the century, significantly above the danger threshold of 2C, with “major implications for us all”. The transition, therefore, must happen sooner and faster. Continue reading...

White House officials say Obama is determined to take lead on climate change during talks set to begin on Monday with bilateral meeting with ChinaLessons from past failures will help push nations towards a robust climate change agreement that will push down greenhouse gas emissions, the White House has predicted.

Security concerns following the Paris attacks have seen the climate march, and other street protests, banned at COP21. Tell us what message you want to send to the heads of state and government

Buy local, look for companies giving something back – or go back to basicsIn 2012 the University of Vermont bravely banned bottled water on campus. It backfired – the number of plastic bottles rose by 6% as students went for soft drinks and juices, increasing their plastic consumption. Eco-friendly bottled water sounds like an oxymoron. But this cautionary tale suggests that sometimes it’s most pragmatic to find the most ethical bottled HO.Water miles remain indefensible. Over 20% of water sold in the UK is sourced overseas though we have our own aquifers. What’s more, bottled water companies here tend to invest in keeping the land pristine to comply with anti-pollution regulations. The land around Ty Nant’s spring in Wales has a large tree-planting programme, while Highland Spring is sourced from certified organic land in the Ochil Hills, Perthshire. So go local and help the environment. Continue reading...

Wessex Bus, First West of England and GENeco have submitted bids to low-emission vehicle grants scheme for more bio-busesDozens of “number two” buses – powered entirely by gas generated from sewage – could be picking up passengers in Bristol next year.Wessex Bus is hoping to run a 20-strong fleet in Bristol, while a rival operator, First West of England, is looking to bring 110 poo-powered doubledeckers to the city. Continue reading...

Next week, world leaders are meeting in Paris at a crucial summit on tackling global warming. Take our quiz to see if you are a climate change expert1Under the Kyoto protocol, the first international climate change treaty, how much, on average, did industrialised nations pledge to reduce their annual greenhouse gas emissions by?4.5% by 2015 compared to 19905.2% by 2012 compared to 19906.8% by 2012 compared to 19908.6% by 2015 compared to 19902What does the UN programme Redd stand for?Ratifying Emissions for the Determination of International DeclarationsRecognised Executive for Drought and DisastersReducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest DegradationRealising that Everything is a Dreadful Disaster3Who first proposed the 2C threshold for dangerous climate change, since agreed at international negotiations?William Nordhaus, a Yale economist in a paper in 1977Alden W Clausen, president of the World Bank at the World Economic Forum in 1981James Hansen, a Nasa scientist to Congress in 1986German chancellor Angela Merkel at the 1992 UN climate summit in Rio de Janeiro4Last year Canada switched on the world’s first commercial carbon capture and storage plant. How much did it cost?$13m$130m$1.3bn$13bn5Which greenhouse gas is the biggest contributor to the greenhouse effect?Carbon dioxideCarbon monoxideMethaneNitrous oxideNitrogen dioxideWater vapour6What proportion of Poland’s electricity is generated through coal?60%70%80%90%7What do the INDCs stand for?International Negotiations to Determine Carbon ReductionsIntentional National Diplomatic CooperationsIntended Nationally Determined ContributionsIdentified Necessary Distributed Carbon Cuts8“It’s about the same as the United States. It’s vastly better than Korea. Of course, it is unimaginably better than China.” Which politician described their government’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions like this?Vladimir Putin, president of RussiaTony Abbott, former prime minister of AustraliaCatherine McKenna, Canada’s new minister of Environment and Climate ChangeAmber Rudd, the UK energy and climate change secretary9Where was COP13, the 2007 UN climate change conference, held?Warsaw, PolandToronto, CanadaNairobi, KenyaBali, Indonesia10Which country is the world’s biggest user of renewable energy technologies, investing nearly $90bn last year?The UKGermanyChinaMorocco Continue reading...

Extreme weather risks the food security of thousands of Lao villages. At the COP 21 talks, will rich countries honour their pledge of $100bn a year by 2020 to help?Namai village in remote, mountainous central Laos has seen immense change in just 20 years. Its isolation only ended when a road was pushed up the valley in 2003, and electricity came several years later.Today Namai villagers mostly have televisions and refrigerators but they, and thousands of other communities, face a new set of problems that are forcing them to develop in ways they never imagined.

As the ‘sea of mud’ continues its path of destruction, allegations have surfaced that the dam collapse was a result of government and industry negligenceThe recent collapse of a mining dam in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais is one of the biggest environmental disasters in the country’s history. Apocalyptic images of communities swallowed by mud and a river flooded by mining waste have shocked a population that has become hardened to tragedy.Between 40-62m cubic metres of the water and sediment from iron ore extraction sluiced down a mountainside more than two weeks ago when the Fundão tailings dam failed at an open-cast mine operated by Samarco, a joint venture between mining giants BHP Billiton and Vale. Continue reading...

In 1991, the southern Swedish city became the first in the world to declare its intention to become fossil-fuel free. So how much progress has been made, and does Växjö offer a blueprint for bigger cities too?Within minutes of meeting the mayor of Europe’s self-proclaimed greenest city, it is clear where he draws much of his inspiration from.It’s not just the fact that 61-year-old Bo Frank is wearing a black Beatles T-shirt and has a Beatles badge pinned to the lapel of his jacket. When he shows me into his office on the ground floor of Växjö city hall, Fab Four memorabilia is everywhere you look – along with photos of Sweden’s king and queen, Barack Obama, and a black-and-white sketch of himself with long hair and a flowered shirt from when he was first elected to Växjö (pronounced Veck-Ruh) city council 41 years ago. Continue reading...

Paris climate deal could render oil, gas and coal projects worthless with US, Canada, China and Australia most vulnerable to losing billionsFossil fuel companies risk wasting up to $2tn (£1.3tn) of investors’ money in the next decade on projects left worthless by global action on climate change and the surge in clean energy, according to a new report.The world’s nations aim to seal a UN deal in Paris in December to keep global warming below the danger limit of 2C. The heavy cuts in carbon emissions needed to achieve this would mean no new coal mines at all are needed and oil demand peaking in 2020, according to the influential thinktank Carbon Tracker. It found $2.2tn of projects at risk of stranding, ie being left valueless as the market for fossil fuels shrinks. Continue reading...

Current pledges to cut carbon emissions will cost developing countries 50% more than if global warming is limited to 2C, Oxfam report saysDeveloping countries will have to pay $270bn extra each year to adapt to the impacts of climate change if global pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions do not increase, according to a new report by Oxfam.Plans submitted by more than 170 countries ahead of crunch UN climate change talks in Paris next week are likely to lead global temperatures to rise by 2.7-3C above pre-industrial times. Continue reading...

Ballina becomes first beach to get ‘smart’ drum lines, previously used in Reunion to hook sharks before they are released further out at seaRelated: Australian surfers stay out of the sea as great whites torment townBeaches in northern NSW will have “smart” drum lines installed off the coast this summer, which will be used to hook and tag sharks before releasing them further out to sea. Continue reading...

Alberta’s climate plan falls far short of what’s possible: unleashing a green economy that creates hundreds of thousands of jobs and transitions off the tar sandsAlberta’s new climate plan is drawing praise from sources that have rarely got on with the oil-exporter – Al Gore, labour unions and some of North America’s biggest green groups. At first glance, it’s not hard to see why: Alberta is promising an accelerated phase-out of coal, increased funds for renewable energy and impacted workers, and a price on carbon. It’s a major step hard to imagine scarcely a year ago, when the province was still under a multi-decade Conservative reign.

My stepfather, Bruce Watkin, who has died aged 98, was one of the founder members of Mass Observation, the social research organisation set up to record everyday life in Britain.Bruce was in at the beginning of Mass Observation in 1937, listening anonymously to ordinary conversations and watching people at work while keeping detailed diaries of what he saw and heard. He served with an eclectic bunch of talented colleagues that included the larger-than-life anthropologist Tom Harrisson, the film-maker Humphrey Jennings, and the poets Charles Madge and Kathleen Raine. Continue reading...

The plucky nonprofit, whose founder’s once dismissed warnings about offshore drilling foretold the BP oil spill, enlists help from Google and Oceana to create a website for tracking illegal fishingNo one knows how much illegal fishing goes on in the oceans. They’re too vast to patrol. But a small nonprofit is helping governments track down seafood pirates by using powerful software, digital maps and publicly available data.That nonprofit, SkyTruth, is led by a 52-year-old geologist named John Amos. It has fewer than a dozen employees and operates out of rural Shepherdstown, West Virginia – population: 2,140. Yet last spring, SkyTruth used its data to help the government of the Pacific island nation Palau track down a Taiwanese fishing ship whose holds were filled with illegally caught tuna and shark fins. Continue reading...

Drought and cyclones hit Somaliland; Kenya mobilises money to tackle changing weather; and the secrecy around cutting girls among Colombia’s EmberáIf you are viewing this on the web and would prefer to get it in your inbox every two weeks, register for the email editionWhen politicians meet in Paris next week to negotiate a global climate deal, their commitments will have far-reaching consequences. Pastoralist communities in Somaliland are among those who have a vital stake in the talks, as a changing climate continues to have a devastating impact. Clár Ní Chonghaile visited Somaliland and met people reeling from drought and cyclones in a region that “could be considered the canary in the mine of a world that is getting hotter, and where extreme weather is becoming more common”.Meanwhile in Kenya, climate funds have been mobilised to create programmes to help farmers become more resilient in the face of changing weather patterns. Read about the projects helping women regenerate trees, harvest rainwater and grow more diverse crops. Continue reading...

Government to give generous export credit to Brazilian oil giant involved in a multibillion-dollar bribery and money-laundering scandalThe UK government will provide hundreds of millions of pounds worth of financial support to Brazil’s national oil company despite it facing corruption investigations in multiple countries.

Small island nations are at the mercy of climate change and rising water levels. Leaders at COP 21 must fight for the emissions cuts that will allow our survivalIn the Caribbean island of Grenada, people know the ocean is rising. Water is about to reach houses in the coastal villages of Soubise and Marquis. Climate change is happening and it is affecting us, and in particular our female farmers. Will world leaders in Paris be able to do what it takes to protect our communities and our world?Climate change is finally on everybody’s agenda, a global renewable energy revolution is under way, and influential religious leaders like Pope Francis have called on governments to consider their impact on the environment. But sometimes, momentum is not enough to break through all obstacles. Continue reading...

Industry looks to the UK to develop factory-built reactors ready to provide affordable, low-carbon energy wherever it is needed – but issues around security and waste disposal remainMini nuclear power plants could be trucked into a town near you to provide your hot water, or shipped to any country that wants to plug them into their electricity grid from the dock. That is the aim of those developing “small modular reactors” and, from the US to China to Poland, they want the UK to be at the centre of the nascent industry. The UK government says it is “fully enthused” about the technology.