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Events such as Storm Chandra take a terrible toll on ecosystems, but nature can be part of the solution for mitigating flood waters
“The flood waters are only good for scavenger species,” says Steve Hussey, searching hard for a silver lining to last week’s deluges brought by Storm Chandra. When the waters recede, crows and ravens will feast on the carrion of hedgehogs, dormice and other small animals unable to escape the rising water, he says.
“It sounds very apocalyptic, doesn’t it?” says Hussey, a communications officer with the Devon Wildlife Trust.
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Framework Convention on International Tax Cooperation could also force ultra-rich to pay global wealth tax
Fossil fuel companies could be forced to pay some of the price of their damage to the climate, and the ultra-rich subjected to a global wealth tax, if new tax rules are agreed under the UN.
Negotiations on a planned global tax treaty will resume at the UN headquarters in New York on Monday, with dozens of countries supporting stronger rulesthat would make polluters pay for the impact of their activities.
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Bruce Friedrich argues the only way to tackle the world’s insatiable but damaging craving for meat is like-for-like replacements like cultivated and plant-based meat
For someone aiming to end the global livestock industry, Bruce Friedrich begins his new book – called Meat – in disarming fashion: “I’m not here to tell anyone what to eat. You won’t find vegetarian or vegan recipes in this book, and you won’t find a single sentence attempting to convince you to eat differently. This book isn’t about policing your plate.”
There’s more. Friedrich, a vegan for almost four decades, says meat is “humanity’s favourite food”.
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A wave of affordable Chinese-made EVs is accelerating the shift away from petrol cars, challenging long‑held assumptions about how transport decarbonisation unfolds
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Last year, almost every new car sold in Norway, the nature-loving country flush with oil wealth, was fully electric. In prosperous Denmark, which was all-in on petrol and diesel cars until just before Covid, sales of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) reached a share of 68%. In California, the share of zero-emissions vehicles hit 20%. And at least every third new car now bought by the Dutch, Finns, Belgians and Swedes burns no fuel.
These figures, which would have felt fanciful just five years ago, show the rich world leading the shift away from cars that pump out toxic gas and planet-heating pollutants. But a more startling trend is that electric car sales are also racing ahead in many developing countries. While China is known for its embrace of electric vehicles (EVs), demand has also soared in emerging markets from South America to south-east Asia. BEV sales in Turkey have caught up with the EU’s, data published this week shows.
The UK government didn’t want you to see this report on ecosystem collapse. I’m not surprised
The 16-month battle to reveal the truth about Sydney Water’s poo balls
Powering up: how Ethiopia is becoming an unlikely leader in the electric vehicle revolution
‘My Tesla has become ordinary’: Turkey catches up with EU in electric car sales
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About 190,000 are still without power in the south-east as states scramble to prepare for more winter weather
Dozens of people have died in the teeth of a severe winter storm across the US south, with further freezing temperatures, snow and blizzards set to assail the east coast on Saturday.
At least 85 people have died across multiple states, according to an Associated Press tally, with frigid conditions and icy roads causing car crashes, hypothermia and other fatal incidents.
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As rivers swell and homes are cut off, scientists say UK winter rainfall is already 20 years ahead of predictions
When flooding hit the low-lying Somerset Levels in 2014, it took two months for the waters to rise. This week it took two days, said Rebecca Horsington, chair of the Flooding on the Levels Action Group and a born-and-bred resident. A fierce barrage of storms from the Atlantic has drenched south-west England in January, saturating soils and supercharging rivers.
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Exclusive: Formal validation for claret reflects hotter conditions, falling consumption and shift towards chillable reds
Bordeaux’s wine industry has historically adapted to consumer habits. In the 1970s the region leaned towards white, but by the 2000s was famed for powerful oak-aged reds.
Now it’s turning to a much older form of red with a name familiar to anglophones: claret. With origins in the 12th century, when it was first shipped to Britain, claret was soon our favoured wine, an unofficial byword for bordeaux red, which in recent decades has become increasingly full-bodied.
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Honduras is one of the most dangerous countries for environmentalists – and the release of Juan Orlando Hernández has reinforced its ‘crisis of impunity’, say critics
When Donald Trump announced that he would pardon the former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, only the second world leader to be convicted of drug trafficking, Anna*, an environmental defender, was shocked.
In 2022, Hernández, also known as JOH, was extradited to the US and later convicted, along with his brother, on drug trafficking and weapons charges. He was sentenced to 45 years in prison for conspiring to smuggle more than 400 tonnes of cocaine into the US, becoming the first Honduran head of state to be tried and sentenced abroad for running a narco state. He was also accused of grave human rights violations.
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Inspired by YouTube creators, some people are limiting beef to a handful of ‘feast days’ a year to cut their climate impact
“I love beef,” says Vlad Luca, 25. But unlike most other self-proclaimed steak lovers, Vlad eats it only four times a year, on designated “beef days”.
The “beef days” phenomenon has been popularised by the brothers John and Hank Green, known collectively as vlogbrothers on YouTube. John, 48, is better known for his YA fiction, including The Fault in Our Stars, while Hank, 45, is a self-described science communicator and entrepreneur.
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Plastics make up the majority of litter across the country. In the absence of regulation, the public are taking matters into their own hands
Change by degrees offers life hacks and sustainable living tips each Saturday to help reduce your household’s carbon footprint
Got a question or tip for reducing household emissions? Email us at changebydegrees@theguardian.com
Neil Blake weighs a paper bag of fake grass fragments he has collected from a stormwater gutter near Darebin Creek in Melbourne’s north.
Over the past three years Blake has conducted 56 collections of synthetic turf in the waterway alongside the KP Hardiman Reserve hockey pitch.
Continue reading...12-year-old Vivaan Sharma was one of 94 patients harmed by surgeon Yaser Jabbar
The Scottish Labour leader says documents prove ministers pushed for the country's largest hospital to open early.
Last year, there was a 15% annual increase in the operations and surgeons want more research.
Maternity services at Lancaster Royal Infirmary are rated "good", but improvements must be made in A&E.
Lord Falconer said the bill has "absolutely no hope" of passing without a "fundamental change" in approach.
Evidence in pharmacist Faisal Shoukat's defence continues to be heard at Bradford Crown Court.
The current policy is that trans men and trans women are entitled to use the pond of their choice.
It could transform our understanding of why diseases develop and the medicines needed to treat them, says researchers.
A coroner wrote to the DWP to express her concerns after the death of Tamara Logan in Tameside.
Peter Dervin says he warned Broomfield Hospital staff not to leave his son alone before fatal fall.
Deep in the mountains of Palawan, Conservation International scientists are capturing what few people ever see: the secret lives of the Philippines’ rarest species.
At Maido — the Lima restaurant recently crowned the best in the world — one of the star dishes is paiche, a giant prehistoric river fish.Its journey to the table begins on a small family farm deep in Peru’s Amazon.
“Jane Goodall forever changed how people think about, interact with and care for the natural world,” said Daniela Raik, interim CEO of Conservation International.
Conservation International’s Neil Vora was selected for TIME’s Next 100 list — alongside other rising leaders reshaping culture, science and society.
Climate change is happening. And it’s placing the world’s reefs in peril. What can be done?
After decades of negotiation, the high seas treaty is finally reality. The historic agreement will pave the way to protect international waters which face numerous threats.
The Amazon rainforest, known for lush green canopies and an abundance of freshwater, is drying out — and deforestation is largely to blame.
The ocean is engine of all life on Earth, but human-driven climate change is pushing it past its limits. Here are five ways the ocean keeps our climate in check — and what can be done to help.
In a grueling and delicate dance, a team led by Conservation International removes a massive undersea killer.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. These pictures might be worth even more. An initiative featuring the work of some of the world’s best nature photographers raises money for environmental conservation.
