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Top seeds: artists capture global efforts to future-proof nature – in pictures
Scientists, ecologists and artists have collaborated to showcase global work to protect seeds in an exhibition at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum & art gallery (Ramm) in Exeter.
Seedscapes: future-proofing nature runs until 5 September
Continue reading...Sharks fleeing toxic red tide take refuge in Florida canal
Lemon, blacktip, bonnethead and nurse sharks retreat from sea as state struggles to contain pollution problem
Hundreds of coastal sharks have taken refuge in a Florida canal, apparently to escape the effects of a toxic red tide outbreak killing hundreds of tons of marine animals.
Related: Sexy secret life of basking sharks uncovered in Hebrides
Continue reading...Labor softens stance on Taylor’s changes to ARENA regulations
Labor to support parts of Angus Taylor's re-issued ARENA regulations, including funds for sustainable transport, metals and microgrids.
The post Labor softens stance on Taylor’s changes to ARENA regulations appeared first on RenewEconomy.
“Best way out of bad situation:” Major river diversion for coal mine repairs
EnergyAustralia allowed to divert 3,500 megalitres a day – roughly 1,400 olympic-sized pools worth of water – from Morwell River to save Yallourn coal mine.
The post “Best way out of bad situation:” Major river diversion for coal mine repairs appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Evolutionary ‘trap’ leading young sea turtles to ingest plastic, study says
Researchers find fragments in innards of species that have adapted to develop in open ocean, which has highly polluted areas
Young marine turtles are swallowing large quantities of plastic, with ocean pollution changing habitats that were once ideal for their development into a risk, researchers have found.
The impact of plastic on wildlife is a growing area of research, and studies have revealed harrowing cases of marine animals sustaining injuries or dying after ingesting such material or becoming entangled in it.
Continue reading...Origin should get out of gas while it can, and shift to green hydrogen
Origin might as well take advantage of federal government support of the gas industry and get out of gas while it can still find buyers.
The post Origin should get out of gas while it can, and shift to green hydrogen appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Hydro Tasmania announces resignation of Momentum Energy Managing Director Amy Childs
Hydro Tasmania CEO Evangelista Albertini has announced that Amy Childs, Managing Director of Hydro Tasmania’s mainland energy retailer Momentum Energy, has resigned.
The post Hydro Tasmania announces resignation of Momentum Energy Managing Director Amy Childs appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Grid Connections: People movements in Australia’s energy business
Job movements at Momentum, Allens, Transgrid, Lavo and Neoen.
The post Grid Connections: People movements in Australia’s energy business appeared first on RenewEconomy.
“Now on right track:” Bulgana wind battery hub to be at full capacity by year end
Neoen says ramp up of Bulgana wind battery hub slower than it had hoped, but it should reach full capacity by the end of the year.
The post “Now on right track:” Bulgana wind battery hub to be at full capacity by year end appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Melbourne outfit launches carbon market trading platform
A software platform described as an essential tool to understand rapidly developing carbon markets launched by its Australian developers.
The post Melbourne outfit launches carbon market trading platform appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Finding answers to the world's drinking water crisis
Then and now: The burning issue of wildfires
Iran water: What's causing the shortages?
UK’s net zero goal ‘too far away’, says No 10 climate spokesperson
Allegra Stratton says carbon emissions must change ‘right now’, as UK moves towards 2050 goal
The UK’s goal of tackling the climate crisis by reducing carbon emissions to net zero by 2050 is “too far away”, the prime minister’s climate change spokesperson has said.
Allegra Stratton, Boris Johnson’s former press secretary, said the “science is clear” that the UK must change its carbon emission output “right now”.
Continue reading...Environment officials questioned use of heritage-listed land as offset for western Sydney airport
Exclusive: Green group decries infrastructure department’s ‘dodgy offset’ plan to use government site that already had protections
Federal environmental department officials questioned the credibility of a government plan to use heritage-listed land it already owned as the main environmental offset for the western Sydney airport.
Documents obtained by Guardian Australia under freedom of information laws show officials asked the federal infrastructure department to justify the use of Defence Establishment Orchard Hills to offset the destruction of more than 100ha of critically endangered Cumberland Plain woodland and other habitat.
Continue reading...The Guardian view on adapting to global heating: risks must be faced | Editorial
Investment in flood defences is overdue. But progress on climate resilience requires confronting vested interests too
Nothing about the climate crisis is easy. The challenge of adapting to global heating and the climate disruption it causes is particularly hard. It forces us to reckon with harms that cannot be undone and is sometimes viewed as jeopardising progress on reducing emissions, by drawing away resources and political will. After all, if we can adapt to climate chaos, why bother trying to prevent it?
Since this argument is a staple of climate deniers, such fears are well founded. But unless we are prepared to stand by as people’s lives are destroyed by extreme weather, adaptation is required. For the relief and protection that they will bring to large numbers of people living in flood-prone areas, last week’s announcements of record funding for new defences in England, along with new guidance and insurance rules, must therefore be welcomed. Disastrous floods in Belgium, Germany and China, and the horror of the North American “heat dome”, have alarmed scientists and focused minds.
Continue reading...Brexit and Covid have created the perfect moment for the politics of crackdown | John Harris
We feel besieged and imperilled, and the Johnson government is seizing the chance to weaken our most fundamental liberties
If you were wondering when the widely predicted post-Brexit dystopia might move beyond the imaginings of TV scriptwriters and into the real world, we suddenly seem to be a lot of the way there. Supermarket shelves are either understocked or completely empty. The populist loudmouths who now try to make the political weather have been taking aim in the past week at the Royal National Lifeboat Institution and its supposedly “woke” lifesavers.
Meanwhile, the Johnson government’s descent into whip-crack law enforcement continues apace. Last week’s announcement of a new “crime reduction plan” was centred around the permanent relaxation of restrictions on “suspicionless” (in other words, often arbitrary) stop and search, which had a clear performative aspect: ministers blithely batting away the fact that black people are a staggering 18 times more likely to be searched than white people under these specific powers, presumably to demonstrate a wretched kind of toughness. Johnson also launched plans for chain gangs dressed in hi-vis jackets.
Continue reading...Tesla Megapack still burning, no word if any delays to Victoria Big Battery
Fire authorities say Tesla Megapacks still burning at Victoria Big Battery, but Tesla boss says too early to say if project will be delayed.
The post Tesla Megapack still burning, no word if any delays to Victoria Big Battery appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Norfolk’s rediscovered ‘ghost ponds’ offer up trove of long-lost plants
Rewilding projects reveal rare species preserved in buried ancient wetlands
The fertile land of Norfolk is home to a host of stately homes, rare wildlife and more ponds than any other county. Now, estates in the area are trying to hunt down ancient “ghost ponds” in the hopes of reviving centuries-old seeds and discovering long-lost plants.
Botanists believe that this will lead to new plant discoveries; seeds can survive for centuries under layers of leaves and mud so once they are given water and exposed to sunlight the plants will grow. Already, six plants of the endangered wetland flower grass-poly have been found at the edge of an old cattle-watering pond on the Heydon estate in north Norfolk. The species had not been seen in the county since the early 1900s.
Continue reading...Adapt or die. That is the stark challenge to living in the new world we have made | David Wallace-Wells
We need to decarbonise and fast. But ‘adaptation’, the ways in which we protect people from the crisis, is not a dirty word
It won’t be enough. It can’t be. From here, even an astonishing pace of decarbonisation will still deliver us a warmer world than we have today, full of more eye-opening extremes and more deeply disruptive disasters of the kind, we are learning this summer, that even the wealthiest and most climate-conscious countries are unprepared for. No one is.
That is what Sadiq Khan, London’s mayor, meant when he wrote, with the capital inundated, that the city was now on the frontline of the climate emergency and it is the central lesson of the Met Office’s annual report on the state of the UK climate, which found that mild British weather was already a relic of a bygone era. The Climate Crisis Advisory Group, led by Sir David King, recently declared that greenhouse gas levels were already so high that they foreclosed a “manageable future for humanity”. “Nowhere is safe,” King said, provoking a host of headlines.
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