Freedom of information requests unearth inconsistent messaging from miner and Northern Territory government on the extent of heavy metal contaminationGlencore has yet to finish erecting signs warning of contaminated river life near a Northern Territory mine more than a year after the miner and the state government became aware of elevated levels of heavy metals.Government documents have revealed inconsistencies in the information given to the public about potential lead contamination of fish near the company’s McArthur river mine, despite the NT government and mining giant being aware of recommendations for warnings since July 2014. Continue reading...

Tropical songbirds produce fewer, high-quality nestlings per breeding effort than do songbirds that breed in temperate zones, according to a study published today. This study reports that tropical songbirds’ nestlings grow longer wings, and faster, which means they spend less time in the nest where they are vulnerable to predatorsIt has been a long-standing ornithological mystery as to why tropical songbirds have smaller clutches of eggs and raise fewer chicks per breeding effort than do temperate songbirds. But today, a study published in the journal Science argues that life history strategies lie at the heart of this conundrum. In this study, evolutionary ecologist Thomas Martin, an Assistant Unit Leader and Senior Scientist at the Montana Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit at the University of Montana, compares nestling growth rates between closely-related species of tropical and temperate songbirds. He documents that nestlings of tropical songbirds grow longer wings, and grow them faster, than do nestlings of temperate songbirds. Further, they achieve longer wings without increasing their time in the nest, which reduces their risk of predation. Further, because tropical songbirds have more resources available to invest into their offspring, they produce fewer chicks per breeding effort and invest more resources into each individual, thereby giving their offspring a higher survival rate after they fledge (leave the nest). In contrast, temperate songbirds have fewer resources available to nurture their chicks and their offspring suffer a higher mortality rate after they leave the nest, so temperate songbirds compensate by producing a greater number of lower-quality offspring. Continue reading...

Renewable energy sector condemns proposal to cut feed-in-tariff for small-scale solar installations by almost 90% from 1 JanuaryThe government wants to slash by 87% subsidies for householders who install solar panels on their rooftops, in a move that renewable energy experts warn could kill off a promising industry.The potential reductions in the level of feed-in tariff (FIT), contained in a long-awaited consultation document released by the Department of Energy & Climate Change (Decc), and are far larger than expected. Continue reading...

After a rough decade, the fishing industry around New Orleans is struggling to recover from the lingering damage from Katrina and the BP oil spillLike Louisiana’s largest city, New Orleans, the state’s verdant, marshy coastline is wild and diverse: a fat, largemouth bass might snatch the same topwater lure in the same fishing spot where you just landed a 30lb bull redfish. Just beyond the beady iridescent eyes of a freshwater gator emerges the fin of a benevolent porpoise. The coastal fishery’s singular bounty has traditionally provided for many.It’s tempting to ask how Louisiana fishing culture is faring 10 years after Katrina. But given the abuse doled out to the state’s fisherman since that famous storm – including three more hurricanes and the effects of the 2010 BP oil spill – it’s a wonder Louisiana’s commercial fishing industry hasn’t gone extinct even sooner than most local fishermen now predict. Continue reading...

Building a wind farm or solar energy project is nothing professionals in fossil fuels can’t manage, but there are too few programmes to help them retrainAdriaan Kamp used to be a die-hard oilman. After 17 years at Anglo-Dutch oil company Shell, the 54-year-old Dutchman now runs a consultancy based in Oslo advising national governments on transitioning to cleaner energy.“In 2007 to 2008, we were looking at future energy scenarios in the Shell Group [and] there was a question on my desk about how do we play with renewables,” he says. “And from there, the journey started.” Continue reading...

From beekeeping to working as a River Cottage chef, here are some of the best schemes for apprentices that want to make a difference in their career Continue reading...

Sully, a pregnant grey-headed flying fox, savours some fresh grapes hours after being found unresponsive on the ground in a Sydney park. She was nursed back to health by a bat rescuer for six weeks before being released, still pregnant. Sully’s carer says bats should not be feared but can carry viruses, so should be handled only by people who are vaccinatedWatch the full recovery story here Continue reading...

If grey squirrels killed every year in the UK were sold for meat, it would be no bad thing. Factory farming is more harmful to the environment

As Barack Obama opens up the Arctic Ocean to oil drilling, how can this pristine wilderness withstand the human hunger for fossil fuels?At midnight on 29 June, the sun was directly north and well above the hills. It had not gone down since I arrived in the Arctic, three days earlier, and would not set for weeks. It rolled around the sky like a marble in a bowl, sometimes behind clouds or mountains or the smoke of the three or four hundred wildfires somewhere south of us, but never below the horizon. The midnight sun made the green hilltops glow gold, and lit our walk through the wildflowers and the clouds of mosquitoes to the mountaintop.Down below, I could see our tents, our camp kitchen, tiny from the heights, and our two rafts, all along the sandy beach and flowery grass bench alongside the shallow Kongakut River. A few days earlier, a couple of bush planes had dropped off our group of nine for a week’s journey 65 miles down the river that threads its way from the Brooks Range of mountains to the northern coast of Alaska. Continue reading...

Ouse Fen, Cambridgeshire It was as if someone had burst a thousand pillows along the bankThere are specks in the sky over every field and garden, silver-spoked seeds of thistledown, the snowflakes of summer. Up there in the blue, some float past to wherever, some bunch up unloved in the corner of a spider’s web, and one has slipped indoors and rests weightless on my windowsill.The other day, I went to a mass-production fluff factory, the thistle-lined dykes of Ouse Fen outside St Ives. Continue reading...

Thirty-five-year-old Hervey Bay man smuggled the reptile in his work boot after purchasing it from Darwin, where it is legal to buy crocodilesA man who bought a pet crocodile under the Northern Territory’s liberal wildlife-purchasing regime fell foul of the law only when trying to smuggle the reptile in his work boot on a plane into Queensland.The juvenile crocodile, which the man purchased from a Darwin crocodile park, was gravely ill by the time it was uncovered by authorities at Brisbane airport in a cardboard canister, hidden in a work boot inside a suitcase that was stored in the plane’s baggage hold. Continue reading...

Anglers join conservationists in high court case, saying Cameron government is failing in legal duty to safeguard rivers and coasts from agricultural run-offConservationists and angling organisations have joined together in a legal challenge, accusing the government of failing to protect some of England’s “most precious rivers” from agricultural pollution.WWF UK, the Angling Trust and Fish Legal say they have been granted permission by the high court to pursue their challenge to protect rivers, lakes and coastal areas from further damage. They are seeking a judicial review, arguing that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Environment Agency are failing in their legal duty to take the necessary action to tackle the problem. Continue reading...

A Q&A with the bestselling author before her visits to Melbourne and SydneyNaomi Klein, the Canadian author, film-maker and social activist, will arrive in Australia this month for a series of events. The author of No Logo and the Shock Doctrine – a self-confessed fan of avocado on toast – will be discussing climate change and capitalism, the key topics in her new bestselling book This Changes Everything. She spoke to Guardian Australia’s Oliver Milman.

Environmental groups band together to call on agency to improve laws for disposal of wastewater, often dumped in places that could leak toxic chemicalsEnvironmental groups have threatened to sue the Obama administration for failing to prevent swarms of earthquakes that came in the wake of America’s fracking boom.

Charlotte Church sings This Bitter Earth outside Shell’s London HQ in protest at plans to begin drilling in the Arctic. The Welsh singer told the crowds gathered under Hungerford bridge she wanted to make the company question what they are doing. The event was staged by Greenpeace, which has been putting on performances every day for the past month as Shell’s vessels have been waiting to proceed through the Chukchi sea, north-west of Alaska Continue reading...

Singer takes part in performance organised by Greenpeace aimed at persuading executives at oil giant to lift lid on plans to drill in Chukchi seaThe trains rumbled overhead, the rain drove in sideways and the buses steered through the crowds. But despite the distractions, Charlotte Church carried on singing the blues song This Bitter Earth.She was performing metres from the oil giant Shell’s headquarters beside the Thames in London, in an effort to persuade company executives to blow the whistle on its Arctic drilling. Continue reading...

New study by European Food and Safety Authority finds ‘high risk’ to bees from neonicotinoid pesticide sprays prompting calls for extending banThree pesticides banned in Europe for their potential to damage bee populations could pose an even greater threat than was thought, according to a new assessment by the European Food Safety Authority (Efsa).Already proscribed for seed treatments and soil applications, the Efsa analysis says that clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam also pose a ‘high risk’ to bees when sprayed on leaves. Continue reading...

Tribe’s crops suffer during search for alternative water sources despite EPA’s insistence that Animas and San Juan rivers in New Mexico are in pre-spill stateDespite watching their sustenance wilt in the summer sun, Navajo Nation tribe farmers near Shiprock, New Mexico, have opted not to reinstate access to river water after a spill at Gold King mine released toxins earlier this month.Related: EPA urges return to normalcy days after toxic Animas river spill Continue reading...

Glued, poisoned, trapped, shot – a shocking report reveals enforcement failure at a colossal scale as hunters across southern Europe and the Middle East kill birds with impunityThe Egyptians line their beaches with fine two-metre high nets that can stretch for miles across the Nile delta and will catch any bird coming close; the Maltese will cover whole trees in nylon; the Cypriots smear branches in glue to stop birds flying; the Italians will kill nearly anything that flies and the French like to set metal traps for small birds.But the sheer scale of the cruelty of the illegal wild bird killings around the Mediterranean which was revealed last week has shocked conservationists and bird lovers across Europe. Continue reading...

As well as focusing on climate-related catastrophes, the 41-step resilience strategy addresses social issues such as poverty, racial inequality and crimeIn the week that marks the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans officials have launched a comprehensive “resilience strategy” aiming to secure the city’s future.

There is no conflict between economic growth and action on climate change, ambassadors told in Paris

Artists, journalists, scientists and academics among 100 signatories calling for mobilisation on scale of slavery abolition and anti-apartheid movementsDesmond Tutu, Vivienne Westwood, Naomi Klein and Noam Chomsky are among a group of high-profile figures who will issue a mass call to action on Thursday ahead of the UN’s crunch climate change conference in Paris in December.They call for mass mobilisation on the scale of the slavery abolition and anti-apartheid movements to trigger “a great historical shift”. Continue reading...

Wenlock Edge, Shropshire As I peer into the yarrow and gentians, thinking about changes in this strange season, a raven flies low over the trees - then the raindrops fallThe curious and alluring autumn gentians are flowering. At the top of the bank where the rabbits have nibbled turf down to the quick and people have broadened the path along the fence, in the wood where the last fragments of wild meadow have been heavily grazed, little clumps of lilac coloured flowers are blooming. I have rarely seen autumn gentian in any of these places until now.This plant is biennial, growing reddish stems less than a foot high. The plants I saw last year had pointy leaves and this year are producing upright tubular flowers that open into lilac stars at the top and reveal inner “ribbons”. They are easy to miss but when they’re spotted they have a strange allure. Continue reading...

Scotty, the baby wallaby, has lunch: 11ml of a specially formulated mix. The tammar wallaby was rescued on Kangaroo Island, South Australia, after his mother was killed on the road. Those looking after Scotty created a Facebook page to chart his progress and to source expert advice on raising an orphaned macropod, the marsupial family to which wallabies and kangaroos belong Continue reading...

The US’s Environmental Protection Agency has given Australia’s Department of the Environment details of recent fracking study and is peer reviewing papersThe Australian government has obtained information from US environmental regulators on the impact of fracking upon water supplies to help inform a new set of guidelines it is preparing on the controversial activity.

Giant panda Mei Xiang is worrying zookeepers at Washington DC’s National zoo by focusing her care on the larger of her newborn twins. This behaviour is normal in panda mothers, so the keepers have a system. Every few hours they swap out the cubs, giving each one time to nurse and bond with its mother, while the other is kept warm in an incubator Continue reading...

Former European commissioner Connie Hedegaard agrees with Tony Abbott that wind turbines are not ‘beautiful’, but calls power plants ‘visually awful’The former European commissioner for climate action Connie Hedegaard has urged countries to acknowledge the cost of reducing emissions to fight climate change, and called on politicians to shift away from short-term thinking.

In an exclusive extract from his new book, Atmosphere of Hope, Tim Flannery argues that recent events in Australia and around the world show how global warming is much more than a debate about scientific projectionsWhen I wrote The Weather Makers, I laid out the state of climate science as it was understood in 2005. The book received much acclaim, but it was also criticised by climate-change sceptics as extremist and alarmist.Since the book was published, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has completed two major summaries, in the form of its fourth and fifth assessment reports, and thousands of scientific publications have added to our understanding of how Earth’s climate system responds to carbon pollution. Continue reading...

In August, the Environmental Protection Agency accidentally unleashed 3m gallons of contaminated wastewater while inspecting the idled Gold King mine near Silverton, Colorado. In Shiprock, New Mexico, Earl and Cheryle Yazzie, members of the Navajo Nation, explain how the spill affected the lives of farmers in their community. Continue reading...

Harapan, who resides at the Cincinnati Zoo, will fly to south-east Asia where most of the estimated 100 remaining rhinos liveAn Ohio zoo that has the last Sumatran rhino in the US on Tuesday announced plans to send the endangered species to south-east Asia on a mission to mate.

The retail giant’s foundation is calling for innovative solutions to waste and pollution but critics say it’s just a way to keep the wheels of fast fashion spinningH&M, one of the world’s largest fast fashion brands, has launched a €1m ($1.16m) recycling prize in an effort to engage innovators, technologists, scientists and entrepreneurs to find a solution to a growing problem in the clothing industry: waste and pollution.The Swedish brand’s foundation, the H&M Conscious Foundation, announced the Global Challenge Award to “catalyse green, truly groundbreaking ideas” that will “protect the earth’s natural resources by closing the loop for fashion”. Continue reading...

Science shows we can’t assume that uranium deposits, when disturbed by mining, can’t leak into groundwater. We should be wary of claims to the contraryIt only takes a few Grand Canyon hikes to realize the importance of its springs and other water sources. When refilling a water bottle in the cool depths below multi-colored rock walls, listening to a summer frog symphony at sunset or maybe snapping an icicle from a weeping ledge in winter, it’s clear that the living desert depends on its pockets of water.That’s why, as a hydrologist and longtime Grand Canyon hiker, boatman and scientist, I am profoundly concerned about continued uranium mining in or near it. It has great potential to irreparably harm Grand Canyon springs and the plants and animals that depend on them. Continue reading...

The winner of the Stockholm Water Prize says communities and traditional techniques are the solutions to drought, not corporationsThe “waterman of India” will walk across five continents to raise awareness for his campaign to have the human rights to river water and access to nature recognised by the UN.“Nature cannot fulfil greed,” Rajendra Singh said on Monday at World Water Week, where he will accept the Stockholm Water Prize on Wednesday. Singh argued that communities facing water crises should resist the money and technological solutions offered by corporations. Instead, he told the Guardian, they must find ways to help themselves. Continue reading...

Jeff Hebert was moved to return home to New Orleans by the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina. In the decade since, he has been at the heart of efforts to rebuild a stronger city, culminating in today’s launch of a future masterplanI’m from the New Orleans area, but in 2005 was living in New York doing neighbourhood redevelopment work. I watched Katrina unfold on television, and after seeing those shocking images, I felt passionately that I needed to come home and use my training to help rebuild the city.I didn’t get to New Orleans until about a month later. My brother picked me up and we drove around the city – we saw awful devastation. His house on Jena Street in Uptown, near the Baptist hospital, was flooded. The entire first floor was ruined; mould had begun to eat the walls. The wooden floors were buckled and the smell was putrid. There was debris all over the streets, and there had been many fires in that neighbourhood. Continue reading...

Temporary approval for two of the three neonicotinoid pesticides linked to decline in bees and banned by the EU is to be challenged in the high courtA government decision to permit the use of banned pesticides linked to declining bee populations is to be challenged in the high court by the environmental charity Friends of the Earth (FOE).The use of three neonicotinoid pesticides is currently illegal under a European Union law, which is due to be reviewed at the end of the year. Continue reading...

A new paper finds common errors among the 3% of climate papers that reject the global warming consensusThose who reject the 97% expert consensus on human-caused global warming often invoke Galileo as an example of when the scientific minority overturned the majority view. In reality, climate contrarians have almost nothing in common with Galileo, whose conclusions were based on empirical scientific evidence, supported by many scientific contemporaries, and persecuted by the religious-political establishment. Nevertheless, there’s a slim chance that the 2–3% minority is correct and the 97% climate consensus is wrong.To evaluate that possibility, a new paper published in the journal of Theoretical and Applied Climatology examines a selection of contrarian climate science research and attempts to replicate their results. The idea is that accurate scientific research should be replicable, and through replication we can also identify any methodological flaws in that research. The study also seeks to answer the question, why do these contrarian papers come to a different conclusion than 97% of the climate science literature?

Quinn Swales charged by male lion during walking safari in Hwange national park, where American dentist Walter Palmer killed CecilA safari guide has been mauled to death by a lion in the same Zimbabwean national park where Cecil the lion was killed by hunters.Quinn Swales was taking guests on a photographic walking safari in Hwange national park at dawn on Monday when he was charged by the male, according to the Camp Hwange lodge. The 40-year-old Zimbabwean saved his guests but died of his injuries. Continue reading...