Company emerges as Europe’s worst climate policy wrecker, according to a new table ranking firms by their records on lobbying and oppositionBP is Europe’s fiercest corporate opponent of action on climate change, according to a ranking of companies by their efforts to obstruct carbon-cutting initiatives.Nearly half of the world’s top 100 global companies are trying to subvert climate policies by lobbying, advertising, and influence-peddling, said the UK-based non-profit, Influence Map. Continue reading...

I was one of the kayakers nearly crushed by a humpback whale, and I can’t stop thinking about the moment it appeared from nowhere – then suddenly changed courseFor the last few days I have been kept awake, and looking up in the dark I see the whale again. The barnacles on its skin, the grooves on its throat, its bigness. I try to comprehend the forces it used to throw itself into the air and which released when it crashed back down. My friend, Charlotte Kinloch, who was in the kayak with me, that morning has been kept awake with the same image – the whale hovering above our beds.Related: Humpback whales, endangered no more? Most may be removed from list Continue reading...

Conflict in the Middle East forces people to flee, but so does drought, destroying crops and livelihoods. We must invest in science for sustainable agricultureThe humanitarian emergency caused by the migration crisis has shocked the world. Desperate scenes of refugees risking their lives at sea or sleeping rough in European train stations are inescapable. But we should also be aware of what has brought us to this point.One of the drivers of this crisis was a five-year drought – the worst ever recorded in Syria – that began in the 2007-8 cropping season. Farmers lost livestock, crops withered, and children went hungry. Many decided to move to nearby cities, hoping for work but finding instead unhealthy living conditions, a lack of community support and few jobs. During the drought, the UN estimated that levels of youth unemployment in Syria reached as high as 48%. Continue reading...

The UK government is pushing ahead with the £24.5bn plant, despite widespread condemnation of what critics say will be an expensive mistake“You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies,” said Oscar Wilde. In the case of the UK government’s bid to build a new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point, the quality of its enemies suggests the plan is idiotic.On Monday, the chancellor George Osborne announced £2bn in government loan guarantees in a bid to get the French-Chinese consortium behind Hinkley to finally commit to the much-delayed £24.5bn project.

Following last year’s People’s Climate March, Devi Lockwood was inspired to cycle around the world collecting accounts of water and climate changeOn 21 September 2014, 400,000 climate activists gathered in New York City for the People’s Climate March, an 85-block-long tide of humanity walking from Central Park to the UN. The purpose? To demand that world leaders take meaningful measures to address climate change. I was a drop in that ocean.Since then I have been slowly traveling the world for a year, mostly by bicycle, to collect 1,001 stories from people I meet about water and climate change. Sometimes I make an audio recording of their story. Continue reading...

The state is ignoring conservation, ecological and social concerns in its pursuit of building a shipping port in mangrove-rich Aghnashini estuaryFishermen and their families living around the Aghnashini estuary on the west coast of India depend on its rich waters for their livelihoods. Now a Goliath of a seaport that ignores environmental laws is about to come up, says Meenakshi Kapoor of Centre for Policy Research-Namati Environment Justice Program.

The trust, with expert help, has whittled down over 200 public nominations to create shortlists of trees throughout the UK Continue reading...

Staff at the Australian Renewable Energy Agency were told on Monday they were being transferred from industry department to department of the environmentThe Turnbull government is signalling a new approach to climate policy despite its pledge to stick with the “Direct Action” climate plan, abandoning Tony Abbott’s attempt to abolish two key renewable energy agencies and considering tougher “safeguards” to ensure the policy actually reduces emissions.

@IndigenousX host Helena Gulwa always knew where she came from and who she was. That’s why she fights to protect her country from frackingI am from West Arnhem Land. I grew up there, spent 40 years of my life there. It is my mother’s country, my identify and it is where I have birth rights. My family taught me a lot about country and how we are connected to the natural environment in Arnhem Land: touching and feeling and tasting, what plants to use, what animals to eat, what wood to use for cooking and what natural herbs to use. Our herbs are special because they are natural medicines that we need for our body, especially for elders and children, but all ages really. It also shows a balanced system of harvesting and protecting special areas for the next season. This is how I grew up and developed an understanding of country and this is why they say to me “you are country”.

West Cumbria As he watched, he saw the peregrine begin its hair-raising 200mph stoop high above the old steel townTwice I have seen a peregrine dive at rocket speed, wings folded back, towards a flock of racing pigeons flying unaware below. The latest dramatic occasion was above Bootle, the village that basks below the whale-shaped mass of Black Combe that dominates the coast near Millom. That time the hawk missed by a hair’s-breadth, the pigeons scattering like chaff.Before that, while climbing on Erne Crag above the Rydal Valley in the 1980s, I saw a similar attack. Again the pigeon escaped as feathers flew, though the screes were strewn with the legs that were all that remained of racing birds following previous onslaughts, their ID rings numbered. Continue reading...

Controversial Hinkley Point plans, which requires Chinese investment, receive boost from chancellor on China tripGeorge Osborne has underlined his determination to get the government’s nuclear energy programme moving by providing a £2bn government guarantee for the delayed Hinkley Point power plant project.The initial backing from the government would pave the way for the construction of Britain’s first new nuclear power station for a generation, Osborne said, as he redoubled his arguments for nuclear in the face of opposition from environmental groups. Continue reading...

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 25 September 1915This morning early the lane leading to the wheat stubble was full of mist, and the uncut grass at its sides was so heavy with dew that walking through it you were wetted to above the ankles. The hedge is high, there are thorns ripe red with bunches of haws, purple vetches climbing among them, mullein in between, hazel boughs overhanging the ditches, dwarf sycamore behind and wild hops clinging to the lower branches. Going through a wide gap one became aware of something like a thin, damp veil drawn across the face, a slight feeling only just perceptible. It was the fine web of a giant brown spider; the insect himself was soon running across one’s shoulder and swinging off to the nearest bush ready to spin again. As the sun penetrated the mist and glistened in the dew you were aware of many of these webs, spun in broad hollows; their main hawser, as it were, from which the whole spun circle tautened down, stretched for a distance of nine feet or more from point to point of two boughs. How did one small creature, without wings, span the open space, carrying his finer than silken thread with him? Infinitely patient, the dispossessed spider presently began to lower himself from the point of a leaf upon which the end of his cord was roved, then swinging to the other side he climbed, and by some kind of intuition, if not by sight, chose a standing opposite, so that the mainstay from which the web would presently depend was like a hanging and swaying light bridge thrown across an abyss. From this strong rope he worked and spun one of the most perfectly shaped structures that nature could show. Continue reading...

In birding, as indeed in life, it’s what you don’t expect that can be confusing. And on a sunny late summer’s day, as I was hunting for grassland butterflies on my Somerset coastal patch, I certainly didn’t think an owl would fly past.My first reaction was surprise, followed by complete bewilderment. It was obviously too dark for a barn owl, so my first thought was a tawny. Superficially the rounded wings and mid-brown plumage did suggest this, our commonest species. Continue reading...

An auroch’s horn in the visitor centre at St David’s in Pembrokeshire tells a story of our distant past when these now extinct giant cattle roamed the coastal plains.The stumps of trees were revealed in 2014 when a storm scoured away the beach and shifted inland the shingle bank that protects the main road at Newgale. Beneath the sand were the tree stumps, the horn, and footprints of the hunters, carbon dated to 2,500 BC. Continue reading...

Martin Winterkorn orders external investigation after US regulators found cars gave inaccurate data on toxic emissionsVolkswagen has ordered an external investigation after US regulators found that the carmaker designed software for close to half a million diesel cars that gave false emissions data, its CEO said, adding he was “deeply sorry” for the violation of US rules.“I personally am deeply sorry that we have broken the trust of our customers and the public,” Martin Winterkorn said in a statement published on Sunday by the carmaker on Sunday. “Volkswagen has ordered an external investigation of this matter.” Continue reading...

Police believe up to 10 wombats – including nursing mothers – were deliberately run down late on Friday night or early on SaturdayUp to 10 wombats have been killed in an apparently deliberate attack in southern New South Wales.Related: Two of Australia’s three wombat species under threat from killer ​disease Continue reading...

Given the murky supply chains involved, is it possible to get a mobile phone that is conflict free?The slick exterior of your smartphone gives few clues to the chaotic supply chains that make up its innards. Some 30 to 40 minerals make it tick, including tantalum, derived from the ore coltan, typically from Congolese mines. As the 2010 documentary Blood in the Mobile lays plain, our phones are inextricably linked to war in the DRC.Our fate as bad consumers seemed sealed in 1997, when mining corporation America Mineral Fields signed an agreement with the Liberation of Congo Defence League to supply funds – which were ultimately used to buy weapons – in return for future mining rights. The rest, as they say, is history. Continue reading...

The senator, who calls the leadership spill treachery, says ‘who knows what would happen’ if the party becomes more like Labor under its new leaderLiberal senator Cory Bernardi has raised the threat of a split in the Liberal party over the new leadership, invoking the damaging battle that saw Malcolm Turnbull lose his leadership in opposition over climate change policy.Bernardi, who has described this week’s leadership spill which deposed Tony Abbott as “treachery”, was asked by conservative commentator Andrew Bolt if there was a possibility of a split.

Lack of ventilation caused by better insulation could create spike in indoor pollutants, research warnsThe number of Britons with asthma could almost double by 2050 because the air inside homes is becoming more polluted as they become more energy-efficient, a new report warns.The trend towards airtight houses could also worsen allergies as well as breathing problems, and even exacerbate lung cancer and heart problems, according to a leading expert in indoor air quality. Continue reading...

With summer officially ending on Wednesday, and reports last week of El Niño bringing wet winters to Britain, Tobias Jones celebrates the many ways in which rural life retains its magic – even as the days start to close in and the holiday visitors flee back to their citiesAutumn can be a grim time of year: a soggy, darkening season in which the languid pleasures of summer, and the celebrations and beauty of winter, seem very far away. It’s the time of year when we realise how far we’ve fallen short of the optimism and resolutions from the start of the year.And yet, for those of us who live in the midst of nature, it is the most mellow and moving of all the seasons. The light is more nuanced, softer somehow. The uniform green of our community woodland has become a collage of russet and copper. The fringes of the magnificent beech tree in our central clearing go a little more yellow each day. The Virginia creepers blush red. Continue reading...

The pope arrives in Washington this week on a landmark visit that, given his radical agenda, comes at a crucial moment for CatholicismThe one thing you could depend on when Pope John Paul II made one of his high-profile overseas trips was that he would hammer home in the most uncompromising terms Catholicism’s opposition to abortion. For the Polish pontiff, who died in 2005 and has now been declared a saint, abortion was murder, a stance which he presented as the keystone of all orthodoxy for Catholics.This week his successor but one, the Argentinian Pope Francis, will be following in John Paul’s footsteps with his own first visit to the United States after spending the weekend in Cuba. Together, the two legs of the trip promise to be among the defining moments of what has already been an extraordinary two-and-a-half-year papacy. Continue reading...

A definitive study released last week found that the amount of wildlife in our oceans has fallen by half in 45 years. Academic and marine expert Callum Roberts says there is still time to reverse this decline by closing areas to fishingSardines were once extraordinarily abundant in the south-west of England, leading one 19th-century guidebook to say: “Pursued by predaceous hordes of dogfish, hake and cod, and greedy flocks of seabirds, they advance towards the land in such amazing numbers as actually to impede the passage of vessels and to discolour the sea as far as the eye can reach … Of a sudden they will vanish from view and then again approach the coast in such compact order and overwhelming force that numbers will be pushed ashore by the moving hosts in the rear. In 1836 a shoal extended in a compact body from Fowey to the Land’s End, a distance of at least 100 miles if we take into consideration the windings of the shore.” (Handbook for Travellers in Devon and Cornwall, John Murray and Thomas Clifton Paris, 1851).Today people travel thousands of miles to dive and film such scenes, not realising they were once commonplace on our own coasts. Last week the World Wide Fund for Nature and the Zoological Society of London issued their most comprehensive look at the state of life in the sea. The report makes uncomfortable reading. Taking in more than 1,000 species worldwide and 5,000 populations of fish, turtles, marine mammals and a host of others, it draws the bleak conclusion that there is only half the amount of wildlife in the sea today as in 1970. Continue reading...

We asked you for your birdwatching photographs from around the world. Here is a selection of our favourites

A seven metre tall tower designed by Daan Roosegaarde filters dirty air, releasing bubbles of smog free air. Does it detract from tackling causes of air pollution?The Dutch city of Rotterdam has opened the world’s first smog-free tower.

‘Man-eating leopards’ have been reported around Abbottabad – Osama bin Laden’s last redoubt – as wildlife officials struggle to reassure publicOsama bin Laden hid out here for months, if not years. But in the hills surrounding Abbottabad in north-western Pakistan, residents say they face a far scarier menace than terrorists.With descriptive stories that bring to mind mythological tales of man against beast, Abbottabad residents claim to be locked in a terrifying battle against Pakistan’s endangered population of leopards. The big cats – referred to as common leopards to distinguish them from their smaller cousins, snow leopards – lurk in the Himalayan foothills. Continue reading...

Frogham, New Forest This spider was both beautiful and docile, but not to be taken for grantedAs spiders go, this one certainly has wow factor. It’s mid-afternoon at the annual Frogham Fair. The lilt of Irish folk music drifts across as crowds line the arena to watch dogs and their handlers show off their skills – and children and grown-ups are recruited to become volunteer equipment as part of the entertainment. But our focus is on a creature many of those entranced by the show would turn away from in horror.We were introduced to it on the hand of 11-year-old Elian Day, a young naturalist who has been more interested in what is in the hedges of the adjacent field than in the veteran cars proudly displayed in it. Continue reading...

The seasoned marathon swimmer hopes to raise awareness on water pollution through his 24,000-mile journey in March 2016: ‘It’s not such a big deal’Martin Strel has a goal: swim more than 24,000 miles around the world to raise awareness of aquatic pollution.

A senior executive of plantation company Bumi Mekar Hijau is one of those held for suspected environmental crimes, as part of a wider drive to combat the pollution haze crisis, reports The Straits TimesIndonesian police arrested seven corporate executives on Wednesday in connection with illegal forest fires across Sumatra and Kalimantan, as part of a wide-ranging effort to stop the haze crisis.Suspects included a senior executive from Bumi Mekar Hijau, a unit of Singapore-based Asia Pulp and Paper (APP), which is also Indonesia’s largest pulp and paper producer. Continue reading...

Environment ministers agree bloc’s joint position after overcoming objections from PolandEurope will not settle for anything less than a robust, ambitious and binding agreement on climate change at UN talks in Paris later this year, the EU’s climate chief has said.“Today’s a very good day. The EU is equipped with a very solid position for Paris,” said Miguel Cañete after environment ministers agreed the bloc’s joint position on the climate summit, overcoming objections from coal-reliant Poland. Continue reading...

As conservation efforts fail, scientists and economists are coming up with increasingly loony and dangerous schemes to save the rhinoLast month it was confirmed that the Sumatran rhino (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis) is extinct in Malaysia. The future looks bleak for this species. The few dozen remaining individuals are confined to remote forests in Sumatra (Indonesia), in refuges that are under siege on an island devastated by rampant deforestation.

Cities worldwide are harnessing the power of gravity to generate electricity from public drinking water pipes

Overpriced, overcomplicated and overdue, the Hinkley project needs to be killed off and the money invested into other low-carbon technologies• Read more: Nuclear supporting environmentalists in call to scrap Hinkley C plansAs committed environmentalists, our conversion to the cause of nuclear power was painful and disorienting. All of us carried a cost in changing our position, antagonising friends and alienating colleagues. But we believe that shutting down – or failing to replace – our primary source of low carbon energy during a climate emergency is a refined form of madness.Because atomic energy provides a steady baseload of electricity, it has great potential to balance the output from renewables, aiding the total decarbonisation of the power supply. The dangers associated with nuclear power have been wildly exaggerated, all too often with the help of junk science. Climate breakdown presents a far greater hazard to human life. The same goes for the air pollution caused by burning coal. Continue reading...

City links: Greening Silicon Valley, Guatemala City’s mystery zone and spray paint cycle safety in Berlin feature in this week’s best city storiesThis week’s best city stories from around the web explore Silicon Valley’s newest sustainability project, an app which automatically sprays potholes you cycle over, the “missing” Guatemala City neighbourhood and Indianapolis’ growing pains with a new electric car share scheme.We’d love to hear your responses to these stories, and any others you’ve read recently, both on Guardian Cities and elsewhere. Just share your thoughts in the comments below. Continue reading...

Three leading experts urge government to end nuclear project saying delays will create panicked scramble back to fossil fuelsThree leading environmentalists who broke ranks to give their support to a new generation of nuclear plants have now urged the government to scrap plans for Hinkley Point C.The call comes as George Osborne and Amber Rudd, the secretary of state for energy and climate change, head off to China, where they will discuss Beijing’s proposed investment in the new nuclear plant in Somerset. Continue reading...

A rare spectacled bear, fighting lions and endangered gibbons are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world Continue reading...

Despite government rhetoric that coal must go, experts say without policy changes this most carbon intensive fossil fuel is set to stay beyond 2030The government is wrong to assume its existing policies will be enough to phase out coal power in the UK, analysts have told the Guardian.Minister for energy and climate change Andrea Leadsom said this week that her department expected unabated (meaning without carbon capture) coal would make up just 1% of the country’s electricity generation by 2025. Continue reading...

As hurricanes become more frequent, keeping track each storm’s name is becoming a challenge. Test your knowledge of the ones you should already know

International energy watchdog’s new head, Fatih Birol, warns of costs and technological challenges but stops short of recommending an outright banDrilling for oil in the Arctic is not yet commercially viable and may not be for a long time to come, the chief of the world’s energy watchdog has warned, casting doubt on the controversial practice even as it is being enthusiastically adopted by governments and businesses.Shell is undertaking exploratory Arctic drilling off the Alaskan coast after the Obama administration granted it a green light in August. Environmental groups have urged a ban, saying it risks one of Earth’s last pristine landscapes and is contributing to climate change, which this week was blamed for Arctic sea ice shrinking to its fourth lowest ever level. Continue reading...

It was just another Thursday night for Donald Trump, from the victory lap at the start to the media storm at the endAs Donald Trump entered the Rochester Community Center in Rochester, New Hampshire for a rally in front of 3,000 people, he was greeted by a full high school marching band playing the Europe song The Final Countdown. He left in the midst of media furor over whether he condoned anti-Muslim bigotry. In between, he took a shot at the Pope and attacked a fellow Republican candidate, all on national television. In short, it was just another Thursday night for Donald Trump.

The demand for leopard skin coats, especially in the United States and Western Europe is endangering the animalNairobi, September 17

Berneray, Outer Hebrides It’s impossible to form one overall impression of the day, only a succession of fleeting imagesThe wind is warm but wild, speeding the low-lying piles of fluffy white cloud across the sky while leaving those higher above relatively unmoving. Patches of blue appear in the newly formed cloud gaps only to disappear almost immediately, causing the landscape one minute to be bathed in sunshine, the next clothed in shadow.It’s impossible to form one overall impression of the day, only a succession of fleeting images the intensity of whose colours constantly alters in response to the changing light. And any attempt to record them except in the human memory proves futile. Continue reading...