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Baroness Brown warns country’s world-class resources must be better used to cope with global heating

Britain has one of the world’s best capabilities for dealing with the climate crisis but is failing to make use of it. That is the stark view of leading expert Baroness Brown, a member of the UK Committee on Climate Change. “We have the ingredients to do good things in response to climate change but are not making use of them,” she warned last week.

Brown, who chairs the CCC’s adaptation sub-committee, said little progress had been made in planning to protect farmland and wildlife from intense storms and changing weather systems, or tackle health threats from rising heat – with grim short-term political consequences.

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Extermination gathers pace, even though new evidence suggests it fails to tackle rise in cases of bovine TB

Up to 50,000 badgers could be killed this year under the government’s controversial culling scheme – nearly double the number of last year and three-quarters of the total killed since the cull began six years ago, campaigners claim.

The increase is caused by a predicted expansion in licensed culling zones – areas where farmers can exterminate badgers, which are blamed for spreading TB in cattle.

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Naturalist Stephen Moss was 13 when he first saw the RSPB reserve in Minsmere, Suffolk. Now he fears plans for Sizewell C could wipe it out

Minsmere and I go back a long way. I can still remember the thrill of my first visit, in 1973, when I was just 13 years old. Later, I made my very first wildlife programme there, with Bill Oddie. And most recently, I presented live programmes from the reserve on the BBC’s red button for Springwatch.

So naturally I am worried that this unique place could be ruined by the proposed building of Sizewell C nuclear power station, a few hundred metres down the coast. And I’m not the only one. My colleague Chris Packham, who like me first went there as a teenager, has called on EDF Energy to ensure that it safeguards Minsmere and its wildlife, now and in the future.

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Consumer awareness of electric vehicles in Australia has reached a tipping point, with the number of people currently researching to buy EVs now tripling.

The post Number of Australians ready to buy electric vehicles has tripled appeared first on RenewEconomy.

No deal would drastically curtail access to EU while entry to Africa would come at price

Farmers across the UK are scrambling to finish their harvests and ship their surpluses abroad before the Brexit deadline of 31 October, when a no-deal departure would force them to abandon European markets in favour of Africa.

There has been a relatively good harvest of wheat and barley this year after the rollercoaster weather of 2018, when a freezing spring followed by a record-breaking heatwave wrought havoc. “Exports have continued at a strong pace since the first weeks of August,” said David Eudall, the head of arable market specialists at the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board.

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Males have begun their walkabout seeking a mate (and hoping not to get eaten) – and this year has seen a big turnout

Gaggles of tarantulas are emerging from their burrows across the western US on a quest to mate, hunting for love in prairies, foothills and a garage belonging to Kim Kardashian West.

From August to October, the eight-legged crawlers go on a walkabout for a once-in-a-lifetime foray to find a partner. The phenomenon is now occurring on a unusually large scale from northern California to Colorado and Texas, shining a light on the arachnids’ remarkable mating behavior, which can involve dancing and cannibalism.

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Tesla unveils deal that cuts around $2,000 off price of Powerwall 2 home battery – but only for members of the company’s VPP program.

The post Tesla slashes price of Powerwall 2 battery by $2,000 for VPP customers appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The Policy Officer Climate Change will be responsible for research and analysis and the provision of advice to executive management and Ministers on policy, regulatory and legislative issues, particularly around climate change, facing Victoria's agricultural industries.

As the Senior Associate, you will lead the Finance Center’s work on climate finance in the UN system, including the United National Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris Agreement.

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

The UK volcanologist John Murray has painstakingly measured Mt Etna for half a century.

Chandrayaan-2 was about to land near the Moon's unexplored south pole when the link went down.

This week we hear some straight-shooting from the Murray-Darling Basin's top cop; and meat without the moo - the future of food, and the role of meat and plant-based alternatives.

Farmers warn of looming food price spikes this summer and zoo elephants chomp down on pineapple plants

Few places on earth are as exposed to the ocean as Kiribati; a chain of 32 islands spread across 3.5 million square km in the East Pacific. This program is a re-issue from the Off Track archives while Ann takes a short break.

India aims to become the first country to make a soft landing on the Moon's south pole.

EUAs dropped back below €25 early on Friday as weak economic data and a looming jump in auction supply weighed amid aggressive selling.

Dr Peter Hounsell writes that the electric bin lorries currently being trialled are nothing new, while Richard Ellam says that it used to be common for councils to burn rubbish to generate electricity

Your report on electric bin lorries powered by energy from household waste (5 September) that are being trialled by Sheffield and Westminster councils suggests that this may be a world first for local authorities.

This may well be the case in the 21st century, but Sheffield also claimed to be the first to do this back in 1915. Electric refuse collection vehicles were not uncommon in the early decades of the 20th century, and one manufacturer claimed to have 50 local authority customers for its vehicles.

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A sleepy Bolivian peccary, fading British heather and a migrating heron in Turkey

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RGGI’s September auction cleared at a discount to the secondary market for the second straight time, as compliance entities purchased more than half of the units on offer, according to results published Friday.