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Week-old baby western lowland gorilla in Congo
Award for fighting civilisation’s greatest challenge
Climate changing ten times faster than historic natural variation
River Dreams
Weatherwatch: how to maximise the power from mighty blades
Engineers are working on turbine blades that automatically adjust to high wind pressure and will stand up to strong winds and turbulent gusts
Wind turbine blades are getting ever larger and producing more power, but fluctuations in wind speed mean they are not always efficient. Blades can now be 85m long (and will be longer in the future) and they swing through an area the size of four football pitches. The wind speed will vary at the top and bottom of each rotation. The blades also have to be robust to withstand the pressure of high winds. Even so, in the worst weather operators sometimes need to angle the blades away from the wind and turn the turbines off to avoid damage. Then they lose production altogether.
Related: Mersey feat: world's biggest wind turbines go online near Liverpool
Continue reading...A Big Country
Alien atmospheres recreated on Earth
UK defies EU over Indonesian palm oil trade, leaked papers show
UK is pushing for a deal that would boost imports linked to deforestation despite EU moves to ban unsustainable palm oil, diplomatic papers reveal
The UK is defying EU institutions to push for a hike in nominally “sustainable” Indonesian palm oil imports which have nonetheless been linked to deforestation, leaked documents show.
The European parliament is currently trying to force a ban on EU biofuels using palm oil, which have driven deforestation and contributed to the loss of 150,000 orangutans in Indonesia since 2002.
Continue reading...Sir John Sulston human genome pioneer dies
Fracking, nuclear fusion and hope for red squirrels – green news roundup
The week’s top environment news stories and green events. If you are not already receiving this roundup, sign up here to get the briefing delivered to your inbox
Continue reading...The week in wildlife - in pictures
Spinner dolphins and a rehabilitated owl are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world
Continue reading...Trump official under fire after granting broad access to mining and oil firms
Exclusive: extractive industry companies who met with Kathleen Benedetto later saw direct benefits from administration decisions
A key Trump administration official scheduled roughly twice as many meetings with mining and fossil-fuel representatives as with environmental groups, public records requests have revealed.
Further investigation shows that some of the firms she met with later benefited directly from administration decisions that weakened wilderness and wildlife protections.
Philippine president Duterte needs psychiatric evaluation, says UN chief
United Nations hits back after Philippines lists special rapporteur on terrorist ‘hit list’
The United Nations and the Philippine government have come to blows over the treatment of human rights investigators, with a UN chief saying the country’s president, Rodrigo Duterte, needs a psychiatric evaluation.
The Philippine government angered the UN after one of its human rights investigators was included on a list of 600 people declared to be communist terrorists.
UN moves towards recognising human right to a healthy environment
Formal recognition would help protect those who increasingly risk their lives to defend the land, water, forests and wildlife, says the UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment
It is time for the United Nations to formally recognise the right to a healthy environment, according to the world body’s chief investigator of murders, beatings and intimidation of environmental defenders.
John Knox, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment, said the momentum for such a move – which would significantly raise the global prominence of the issue – was growing along with an awareness of the heavy toll being paid by those fighting against deforestation, pollution, land grabs and poaching.
Bike safety consultation shows someone in government might understand cycling
Amid plans for an unnecessary law change targeting cyclists, a parallel government consultation on safety makes some unexpectedly sensible points
For those interested in the many benefits that come from getting more people cycling, there’s some bad news and good news today – and in another minor compensation, at least the bad news was widely expected.
This is the confirmation from the Department for Transport (DfT) that, as widely trailed at the weekend, a review it commissioned has recommended there should be a new law about causing death or injury by dangerous cycling, as for driving.
Continue reading...Tories lambasted for rejecting 'latte levy' on takeaway coffee cups
Government accused of frothy talk on reducing throwaway packaging waste
Ministers have rejected calls for a “latte levy” on takeaway coffee cups to reduce the amount of waste they create.
Mary Creagh, the chair of the environmental audit committee, accused the government of talking warm words but taking no action after ministers refused to adopt a charge on throwaway coffee cups similar to the plastic bag levy.
Continue reading...Scientists seek public's help to map plastic on UK beaches
Project hopes to get more than 250,000 drone images tagged to record type and extent of plastic pollution
Food wrappers, fishing nets, bottles, straws and carrier bags are among the top 10 plastic items littering British beaches, according to new research.
Related: Is there life after plastic? The new inventions promising a cleaner world
Continue reading...Country diary: it feels like the trees could start lumbering forwards
Hulne Park, Alnwick, Northumberland The dawn redwood is unchanged since the Cretaceous era. No wonder they have a Lord of the Rings quality
Contorted and deeply furrowed, the flared bole of this tree has a Lord of the Rings quality. I almost expect it to start moving and lumber towards me like an Ent. Beneath the point where each branch leaves the trunk there are shadowy elbow-deep clefts. Its muscular ridges are a rich burnt orange, and ripple down to the ground like anchoring roots, making the twisted trunk look like it is screwing itself down into the earth. This is a dawn redwood, Metasequoia glypstostroboides, one of an avenue either side of Farm Drive in Hulne Park.
A medieval hunting ground of thousands of acres that provided food and wood for Alnwick Castle, Hulne Park is entirely enclosed in a 3m high perimeter wall. Deep in its heart are the ivy-draped ruins of a 13th-century Carmelite monastery, built on a steep grassy mound. We enter the demesne through the arched gateway of Forest Lodge, where early periwinkles bloom beneath walls covered in leafless vines of Virginia creeper. A woodpecker drums on a reverberating branch and the sound of a crowing cockerel echoes through the woods.
Continue reading...Nuclear fusion on brink of being realised, say MIT scientists
Carbon-free fusion power could be ‘on the grid in 15 years’
The dream of nuclear fusion is on the brink of being realised, according to a major new US initiative that says it will put fusion power on the grid within 15 years.
The project, a collaboration between scientists at MIT and a private company, will take a radically different approach to other efforts to transform fusion from an expensive science experiment into a viable commercial energy source. The team intend to use a new class of high-temperature superconductors they predict will allow them to create the world’s first fusion reactor that produces more energy than needs to be put in to get the fusion reaction going.
Continue reading...Citizens of the Great Barrier Reef: going beyond our backyard to protect the reef
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