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One of Australia’s most elusive birds, a 2,200km journey and a mid-winter mystery solved
A new project that aims to uncover where the Australian painted-snipe goes during winter has revealed why, until now, no one knew
It had been three months without a peep, and the ecologist Matt Herring thought Gloria had perished. He had captured the elusive bird on 22 October 2023, on a property north of Balranald in New South Wales – the first Australian painted-snipe to be fitted with a radio transmitter.
But contact had been lost, and there was a sticky complication: Gloria’s transmitter had been financed by a successful crowdfunding campaign. Herring started preparing an obituary for the avian pioneer for her species.
Continue reading...Death Valley records its hottest month ever in July
The national park had an average 24-hour temperature of 108.5F that month, beating its previous record in 2018
Death Valley, the hottest place on Earth, recorded its hottest month ever on record in July, the National Park Service (NPS) announced.
In a statement released on Friday, the NPS revealed that the park had an average 24-hour temperature of 108.5F (42.5C), in turn beating out its previous record of 108.1F (42.3C) set in 2018.
Continue reading...I swear by almighty river: an ancient practice is making a comeback in Britain's courts | Tim Adams
When a juror was sworn in on a cupful of water from the Roding he made modern history
The barrister Paul Powlesland, who has acted for climate protesters, was called to jury service last week, and made judicial history by taking an oath on the thing most holy to him – not an ancient book, but a cupful of water from his local river in north-east London: “I swear by the River Roding, from her source in Molehill Green to her confluence with the Thames,” he said, “that I will faithfully try the defendant and give a true verdict according to the evidence.”
Powlesland explained that he wanted to promote the idea of the sacredness of nature, and its place in the legal system. “I hope that many others follow suit,” he said, “and animism is soon found more regularly in our courts.”
Continue reading...Ecologist taking on MoD to protect skylarks says he has faced threats and assault
Campaigners say rare grassland on former firing range in Essex was mowed, killing the birds and their chicks that nest on the ground
The song of the skylark has filled poets’ hearts for centuries, from Shelley’s “blithe spirit” to Wordsworth’s “ethereal minstrel”. But there is little that is poetic about a row over the birds that has blown up in Colchester.
Campaigners seeking to save Middlewick Ranges, a former Ministry of Defence firing range in Essex, are furious that some of the 76 hectares of rare grassland were mowed last month, an act that they believe has killed skylarks and their chicks, which nest on the ground.
Continue reading...‘This is climate change’: Scottish beach eroding by 7 metres a year
Centuries-old Montrose golf links falling into the sea and town at risk of flooding as coastal erosion accelerates
A beach in north-east Scotland is eroding rapidly owing to climate change, leaving a town at risk of flooding and its centuries-old golf links crumbling into the sea.
The Dynamic Coast report in 2021 studied the rate of erosion at Montrose and predicted that 120 metres would be lost over 40 years, an average of 3 metres a year.
Continue reading...Speculators realise profits as RGAs peak, build CCA net length
OCFP net credit generation in Q1 trails last quarter’s record high
Minnesota concludes Summit CO2 pipeline to have net emissions benefit
Alaska signs CCUS bill into law
The Guardian view on reclaiming the Seine: hope for 21st century rivers | Editorial
Paris 2024 has pointed the way towards a brighter future for urban waterways in post-industrial cities
It was an American modernist poet who captured best the ancient, elemental status of rivers. In one of his best-loved poems, Wallace Stevens celebrated their “third commonness with light and air / A curriculum, a vigor, a local abstraction”. Life-supporting and place-defining, the great rivers of the world have nurtured and sustained our cities, but more latterly been blighted by the toxic legacy of industrialisation.
The successful staging of Olympic events in a cleaned-up River Seine therefore deserves to be seen as a social and environmental milestone, as well as a sporting one. The remarkable spectacle of triathlon competitors diving from the Pont Alexandre III, as the Eiffel Tower loomed large on a blue-skied summer morning, will take some beating as a signature image of Paris 2024.
Continue reading...Germany publishes long-awaited draft law to transpose EU carbon market directive, implement ETS2
Utah’s Great Salt Lake rings climate alarm bells over release of 4.1m tons of carbon dioxide
Study has found that the lake, which has lost 73% of its water, released climate-warming emissions
For years, scientists and environmental leaders have been raising alarm that the Great Salt Lake is headed toward a catastrophic decline.
Now, new research points to the lake’s desiccating shores also becoming an increasingly significant source of greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists have calculated that dried out portions of the lakebed released about 4.1m tons of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in 2020, based on samples collected over seven months that year.
Continue reading...UN shipping body inches closer to key carbon levy decision with release of impact assessment
Canadian carbon offset developer postpones London listing, citing market conditions
New EU rules on industrial, livestock emissions enter into force
DATA DIVE: Carbon markets could scale from small share of climate finance flows with smart policy
UK, Laos sign MoU to collaborate on carbon markets, energy transition
Choughs breed in Kent for first time in 200 years
Unexpected fledging is result of long-term restoration project to bring red-billed birds back to Kent coastline
The chough, a charismatic cliff-dwelling corvid, has bred in Kent for the first time in two centuries.
A young pair among eight birds released last year defied expectations to successfully breed this summer, making a nest on Dover Castle and rearing one chick, which fledged in June.
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