Feed aggregator

Driven out by hunting and habitat loss, the snow-white birds are now nesting and breeding in a few pockets in England

With their long, spoon-shaped beaks, it is perhaps little surprise that the RSPB has nicknamed the offspring of a spoonbill a “teaspoon”.

It has been a bumper year for the snow-white wading birds, which have been found nesting and breeding in Cambridgeshire for the first time since the 17th century.

Continue reading...

Verra will pause the review of new voluntary carbon methodology proposals until the first quarter of 2025 as it implements changes to its review process.

Union says members being ‘kept up at night’ over failure to commit to continue payments at current rate

Farmers are facing a “cliff edge” as the Labour government refuses to commit to maintaining the agriculture budget for England, the president of the National Farmers’ Union has said.

The issue is one of the first pressures Labour is facing over its tight fiscal rules, along with a rebellion on the party’s refusal to remove the two-child benefit cap.

Continue reading...

Industry, political groups and environmental NGOs largely welcomed Ursula Von der Leyen's re-appointment as European Commission President on Thursday, citing "continuity" and "stability" in Green Deal policies as reasons for optimism.

Organisers working to ensure safe environment for attenders in October after guerrillas’ warning of disruption

Colombian authorities have insisted it will be safe to attend a UN biodiversity summit in Cali later this year, after a dissident rebel group threatened to disrupt the event.

This week Central General Staff (EMC), a guerrilla faction that rejected the country’s 2016 peace agreement, said the UN nature summit Cop16 would “fail”, in a post on X addressed to the Colombian president, Gustavo Petro.

Find more age of extinction coverage here, and follow the biodiversity reporters Phoebe Weston and Patrick Greenfield on X for all the latest news and features.

Continue reading...

A US-based NGO active in carbon markets has teamed up with an investor to scale funding into nature-based carbon removal projects linked to farming land, they announced Thursday.

Campaigners receive longest ever sentences for non-violent protest after being convicted of conspiracy to cause public nuisance

Five supporters of the Just Stop Oil climate campaign who conspired to cause gridlock on London’s orbital motorway have been sentenced to lengthy jail terms.

Roger Hallam, Daniel Shaw, Louise Lancaster, Lucia Whittaker De Abreu and Cressida Gethin were found guilty last week of conspiracy to cause a public nuisance for coordinating direct action protests on the M25 over four days in November 2022.

Continue reading...

A conservation finance group has held discussions on the measures needed to scale the emerging biodiversity credit markets, stressing the importance of advancing government efforts to regulate transactions at a global level.

Net zero policies, such as a consistent and strong carbon pricing growth out to 2050, could unlock significant economic growth for the EU and UK economies and bring forward net zero, according to a new report.

An Amsterdam-based company has launched a new direct air capture product designed to be suited to plug into any removal, storage, or utilisation project across different capacities and sectors.

A plan submitted for buying units representing habitat uplift, under England’s biodiversity net gain (BNG) scheme, could be the first of its kind, said a lawyer.

A French company developing bio-based acids for a range of applications from food preservatives to perfume says that its products carry an 81% lower carbon footprint than their petroleum-based counterparts, and could also store carbon depending on the final use case.

The new UK government needs to speed up the country’s emission reductions to make up for its predecessor’s slow-down, reversal, and delay of net zero policies - including a strengthening of its carbon trading system, the Climate Change Committee warned on Thursday. 

A subsidiary of large European energy firm EON plans to present a plan for crediting emissions reductions from battery storage projects at COP29 in November.

Some G20 regulators have decided not to work on nature-related financial risks due to data challenges and the need to prioritise climate-related analysis, a report released on Thursday showed.

A new voluntary carbon insurance product has launched to avoid the risk of credits failing to be delivered from nature-based projects, initially for reforestation and afforestation activities.

European carbon allowance prices weakened modestly on Thursday morning, trading in a narrow band before coming up against a psychological and technical support level, while energy markets were mixed amid a broadly unchanged outlook.

It’s July! It should be all about picnics and ice-creams, not plastic rain ponchos. I have officially lost my joie de vivre

That’s it, I’m calling it: this is the worst summer ever. Despite the fact we are currently seeing a fleeting glimpse of sun, the weather has been notably dismal. The Met Office says it could be the coldest summer of the past 24 years. Last week, it started raining inside our bedroom as well as outside, and, after days and days of cold and wet weather, that felt like the final straw. This is my Sad girl summer. Having never before suffered from seasonal affective disorder, I have officially lost my joie de vivre. And I know I’m not alone. Moaning about the weather may be an Olympic sport for the British, but this feels different. During social interactions people seem too listless and despondent to even have a proper whinge. They just shake their heads, sadly, while staring at their shoes. This can’t go on. Can it?

Well, apparently it can, with some predictions saying we will be enduring this autumnal chill until, well, actual autumn. The thought of entering winter without having fully charged up on sunshine fills me with a looming sense of horror. Having grown up in the mountains of north Wales, I have an abnormally high tolerance for rain. I’m basically a bog witch comprised of 60% water and 40% lichen. I can spend days indoors and not get cabin fever. Saying that, wet Welsh weather is partly why I moved south. My dad, who is visiting at the moment, treats London as if it’s the Costa del Sol. Look at everyone eating outdoors, like Spaniards! But though the sun may be shining as I write this, we know the drill by now: it peeks out for just long enough to remind us that it exists, before retreating behind another heavy, grey cloud fecund with rain. Emergency-poncho-clad tourists haunt the streets like plasticky ghosts.

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist and author

Continue reading...

A Chinese province known for its local timber industry has completed a first transaction of forest carbon credits under a recently launched provincial programme, as the regional government seeks to explore the potential of nature-based projects.

An EU-based carbon removal (CDR) accelerator has announced the selection of eight startups for a development stage of its programme, including a 'negative emission' coal producer, a biochar firm, and a solution focused on decarbonising the construction sector.