-
Scientists say ‘shocking’ discovery shows rapid cuts in carbon emissions are needed to avoid catastrophic fallout
The collapse of a critical Atlantic current can no longer be considered a low-likelihood event, a study has concluded, making deep cuts to fossil fuel emissions even more urgent to avoid the catastrophic impact.
The Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (Amoc) is a major part of the global climate system. It brings sun-warmed tropical water to Europe and the Arctic, where it cools and sinks to form a deep return current. The Amoc was already known to be at its weakest in 1,600 years as a result of the climate crisis.
Continue reading...
-
With rising temperatures causing chaos worldwide, what does it mean to be a tourist in a world on fire?
• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox?Sign up here to get the newsletter in full
“Where shall we go on holiday?” would not, ideally, be a stressful question.
But the world in 2025 is far from ideal, and summer breaks in Europe and North America are no exception. Holiday hotspots are being ravaged by heat, fire, floods and drought as fossil fuel pollution warps the climate – and travelling to reach them in planes or on cruise ships spews far more planet-heating gas than anything else you and I are likely to do. (Rocket enthusiasts such as Katy Perry and Jeff Bezos, I assume, have not yet subscribed to Down to Earth.)
‘We cannot do it the way our fathers did’: farmers across Europe struggle to adapt to the climate crisis
‘Unlike any other kind of fear’: wildfires leave their mark across Spain
Europe scorched by wildfires – pictures from space
Continue reading...
-
The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
Continue reading...
-
Spurred into action by the species’ threatened future, two best friends embarked on a project to release 250 of the animals in Devon
Doing somersaults in the corner of a field in Devon this week were the fluffy results of an audacious wildlife project by two 13-year-old girls.
Best friends Eva Wishart and Emily Smith had become devoted to harvest mice, and were upset, a couple of years ago, to find out the species is threatened in England due to farming practices and habitat loss.
Continue reading...
-
Particles are small enough to burrow into lungs, says report, with health impacts ‘more substantial than we realize’
Every breath people take in their homes or car probably contains significant amounts of microplastics small enough to burrow deep into lungs, new peer-reviewed research finds, bringing into focus a little understood route of exposure and health threat.
The study, published in the journal Plos One, estimates humans can inhale as much as 68,000 tiny plastic particles daily. Previous studies have identified larger pieces of airborne microplastics, but those are not as much of a health threat because they do not hang in the air as long, or move as deep into the pulmonary system.
Continue reading...
-
South Downs, West Sussex:Now is the time for the last orchid of the season – autumn lady’s tresses. Or, it should be
“Nature loves to hide”, or so proclaimed the riddling ancient philosopher Heraclitus. These past few weeks, I’ve been on the lookout for the last of the season’s orchids – Spiranthes spiralis, or autumn lady’s tresses – and I’m starting to see what he meant.
Today I’m crouched near the top of Wolstonbury Hill, eyes peeled. The place is certainly teeming: scabious and hawkbit dance with the dried-out grasses; bees hum and linnets chatter on a hawthorn. The orchids that I’m seeking grow from long-lived tubers, and I saw a handful in this precise location last summer, so I know they’re here. So far, though, no sign.
Continue reading...
-
Exclusive: Analysis of responses shows firms are urging parliamentarians to limit regulation of ‘forever chemicals’
Chemical firms are lobbying MPs not to ban “forever chemicals” in the same way as proposed in the EU, using arguments disputed by scientists and described as “big tobacco playbook” tactics, it can be revealed.
Pfas, short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances and commonly known as forever chemicals owing to their persistence in the environment, are a family of about 10,000 chemicals, some of which have been linked to a wide range of serious illnesses, including certain cancers. They are used across a range of industries, from cosmetics to firefighting.
Continue reading...
-
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Feargal Sharkey back campaign to save the animal, which once inspired placenames, songs and stories
When the Somerset Levels flood in winter, their reed-fringed waterways swell into a glinting inland sea – haunting and half forgotten.
Generations ago, these wetlands pulsed with the seasonal arrival of eels: twisting through rhynes – human-made water channels – and ditches in their thousands, caught in baskets, sung about in pubs and paid as rent to Glastonbury Abbey. Today those same waters flow more slowly, more sparsely: once-teeming channels now show only the barest traces of what was here.
Continue reading...
-
Volunteers are tasked with logging about 150,000 park trees by hand – and for some, it’s become a strange obsession
On a recent morning, as the late August sun began to beat down, a few dozen New Yorkers stood in the shade of one of the nearly 500 trees adorning Harlem’s Marcus Garvey Park, worrying a bit about hurting its feelings.
We had already identified the species – bald cypress – thanks to its feathered leaves and “strong pyramidal shape”, measured its trunk’s circumference (17in; 43cm), and noted that its roots appeared normal, its leaves were healthy and its branches had suffered some damage from improper pruning. But now we were tasked with assigning the tree an overall grade – on a scale of “poor” to “excellent” – and no one seemed to want to say.
Continue reading...
-
The global music star, whose home town of New Orleans was devastated by the hurricane in 2005, says ‘people power’ can change the world
Twenty years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged his home town of New Orleans, Jon Batiste has released a new song imploring people to take action against climate change “by raising your voice, and insisting, and voting the right people into office”.
“As an artist, you have to make a statement,” the global star said in an interview on Tuesday with the international media collaboration Covering Climate Now. “You got to bring people together. People power is the way that you can change things in the world.
Continue reading...
For the common good