Feed aggregator

Biggest analysis to date reveals huge footprint of livestock - it provides just 18% of calories but takes up 83% of farmland

Avoiding meat and dairy products is the single biggest way to reduce your environmental impact on the planet, according to the scientists behind the most comprehensive analysis to date of the damage farming does to the planet.

The new research shows that without meat and dairy consumption, global farmland use could be reduced by more than 75% – an area equivalent to the US, China, European Union and Australia combined – and still feed the world. Loss of wild areas to agriculture is the leading cause of the current mass extinction of wildlife.

Continue reading...

New total represents an increase of 25% since 2010 in its central African heartland

It is one of the most recognisable animals in the world and one of the most endangered, but a new census reveals the surviving mountain gorilla population has now risen above 1,000.

This represents a rise of 25% since 2010 in its heartland of the Virunga Massif in central Africa. It also marks success for intensive conservation work in a region riven by armed conflict, and where six park guards were murdered in April.

Continue reading...

The number of Colombian CERs being cancelled against the country’s carbon tax by big emitters is approaching 1.5 million after another batch was annulled last week.

This position is in the Air & Climate group within the Regulatory Affairs/Energy and Environmental Policy / Environmental Affairs & Sustainability department. The successful candidate will provide key subject matter expertise to executive and senior management on issues related to climate policy and transportation electrification.

We are looking for a self-motivated graduate, with a real desire to drive action on sustainability, to help us cut 20 million tonnes of CO2 and improve 20 million lives by 2020. Working as a key member of the Client Services team in the UK, you will be responsible for managing ClimateCare’s SME accounts and helping to encourage new corporate partners to work with us – taking action on climate change and improving people’s lives.

Security forces launch raids linked to deforestation in the Carpathian mountains, home to some of Europe’s last virgin forest

Romania’s security forces have mounted a series of raids to break up an alleged €25m illegal logging ring, in what is believed to be the largest operation of its kind yet seen in Europe.

Officers from Romania’s Directorate for Investigation of Organised Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) swooped on 23 addresses – including factories owned by the Austrian timber group Schweighofer Holzindustrie, according to local press reports.

Continue reading...

We’d like to hear about – and see pictures of – the small things you are doing to encourage nature where you live

Naturalist Patrick Barkham wrote in the Guardian this week about the principles of rewilding – stepping back and allowing natural processes to occur, and encouraging wild plants and insects.

Related: How to rewild your garden: ditch chemicals and decorate the concrete

Continue reading...

The humble seaweed is enlisted in the fight against climate change.

EU carbon prices slid by almost 5% in early trade on Thursday to continue the previous session’s downward slide, as traders unwound a chunk of May's stellar gains ahead of month-end.

The science toolkit to cool the planet from geo-engineering to growing seaweed and protecting nature for human health.

Is it time for radical action to combat climate change?

The fragment found inside the harp seal found on Skye may have caused a range of health problems, scientists say.

A Singapore-based energy and carbon research and analysis manager has left mining major BHP Billiton to co-found a European demand response company aiming to allow households to earn money from turning off their electric devices.

Sun Metals solar farm - which led the way for corporate Australia to source their own renewable energy needs - switched on in Queensland.

New Zealand carbon allowances dropped below the NZ$21 mark on Thursday, the deadline for emitters to surrender permits for their 2017 output, as the historic surplus of millions of NZUs meant few participants had any issues meeting their targets.

Melbourne bird species decreased in proportion to density of human occupation

The outskirts of Melbourne are a maze of newly-paved culs-de-sac. Freestanding homes twist in on each other, filling the footprint of their small street blocks.

On the other side of the road, short wooden stakes have been tied with fluorescent tape to mark out the next development.

Continue reading...

Booker prize-winning author predicts climate reality will not be far from scenarios imagined in her post-apocalyptic fiction

Climate change will bring a dystopian future reminiscent of one of her “speculative fictions”, with women bearing the brunt of brutal repression, hunger and war, the Booker prize-winning author Margaret Atwood is to warn.

“This isn’t climate change – it’s everything change,” she will tell an audience at the British Library this week. “Women will be directly and adversely affected by climate change.”

Continue reading...

Australia is one of the few countries in the world where hives are free of the debilitating varroa mite

The soaring price of Australian beeswax could be bad news for local beard owners – and good news for scammers – as demand for high-quality beeswax heats up.

New uses for the wax – from cosmetics to food wraps – and the comparative health of Australia’s bees have driven the export price of Australian beeswax up in the global marketplace.

Continue reading...

With no spectators, no bags of freebies and no medals, the 400km London-Wales-London ride provides a welcome antidote to overblown sportives

“Cycling far?” asks a woman in the bakery as a group of us queues for coffee and sausage rolls, as well as an all-important receipt to prove we passed through Tewkesbury.

Increasing numbers of cyclists are getting bored with 100-mile sportives and looking for something else

Continue reading...

Coalition says proposed phosphate exploration would have had unacceptable impact on wildlife, including endangered sea bird

The Turnbull government has knocked back a controversial phosphate exploration proposal on Christmas Island “because it is likely to have significant and unacceptable impacts on matters protected under national environment law”.

Phosphate Resources Limited – the owners of a phosphate mine on Christmas Island – had proposed to clear 6.83ha of land and undertake exploration drilling along 44 survey lines in an effort to determine the extent of the additional phosphate resources on Christmas Island.

Continue reading...