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Australian health experts have written to all State and Territory leaders ahead of the COAG meeting this week, strongly urging them to reject the National Energy Guarantee, and establish national energy policies that will reduce the alarming rates of sickness and deaths across the nation.

20 November 1917 The few leaves which still remain upon the branches hang like soiled and tattered rags

The wonderful colouring of a few weeks ago has vanished, and the few leaves which still remain upon the branches hang like soiled and tattered rags; the litter below the trees is full of moisture, blackening with decay. For once the wood is positively untidy. Windfall boughs and twigs, green and red with fungoid growths, lie everywhere, the larger branches holding the withered leaves; the healthy, living tree is the first to shed its foliage. A red campion here and there and a few thistles are the only visible flowers; the latter are bravely open, though their stalks, wilting slightly, are without a single living leaf. The osiers stand a foot deep in water, for the ditches have overflowed, converting the withy bed into a lake from which the willows rise, many islands.

Related: Why we should celebrate winter woodland – not just the Christmas tree

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Emma Tristram says the legislation to protect ancient woodland may have the perverse effect of causing the most damaging option to be chosen

Thank you to Patrick Barkham for highlighting the destructive insanity of the Arundel bypass scheme (The road to rural oblivion, 14 November). He mentions ancient woodland and says it needs legal protection. Actually ancient woodland (ie, wooded since 1600) already has legal protection, and “compensation planting” is required – the ratio is decided by English Nature, but may be a multiple of seven or even up to 30 times the area taken.

The legislation to protect ancient woodland may have the perverse effect of causing the most damaging option to be chosen. Highways England has run a public consultation, which blatantly favours the route through Binsted woods, 100 hectares of superb quality semi-natural broadleaved woodland. The woods have been here since the Domesday Book – huge, mysterious, unmanaged, full of fallen trees that have regrown from horizontal, and an incredibly rich hotspot for rare wildlife. But some parts have had a cleared period in the last 400 years, so are not designated as ancient woodland.

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India's capital New Delhi has been plunged into smog, a year after suffering a similar crisis. Without an end to crop burning, the problems with smog will only continue. Vijay Koul, Honorary fellow, CSIRO Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

A telegram obtained by Greenpeace shows that Greg Hands met a Brazilian minister to discuss relaxation of tax and environmental regulation

Britain successfully lobbied Brazil on behalf of BP and Shell to address the oil giants’ concerns over Brazilian taxation, environmental regulation and rules on using local firms, government documents reveal.

The UK’s trade minister travelled to Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte and São Paulo in March for a visit with a “heavy focus” on hydrocarbons, to help British energy, mining and water companies win business in Brazil.

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New Finkel report says energy storage important, and represents a huge opportunity for Australia, but there is no reason to panic. Even at 50% wind and solar the need for storage is modest, and much could come from households.

It was great news for fish and chips fans when North Sea cod was certified sustainable. Steady on though, there are still things to worry about at sea

Here’s a food truth: most Britons are happy to say “cod and chips, please” without even thinking about the sustainability impact of our favourite Friday night supper. Our love of white flaky fish has been a nightmare for fish campaigners. North Sea cod stocks plummeted from 270,000 tonnes in the 1970s to 44,000 tonnes in the early 2000s.

North Sea cod stocks plummeted from 270,000 tonnes in the 1970s to 44,000 tonnes in the early 2000s

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The Balkan country has the world's second highest death rate caused by air pollution.

Floods have been a deadly staple of 2017. But can you protect yourself against the natural disaster?

Crocodiles have entered the fray in the Queensland election campaign with fear of crocodile attacks being blamed for a drop in membership numbers at Surf Life Saving Clubs in Far North Queensland.

Remote Willis Island, in the middle of the Coral Sea, is home to colonies of seabirds, green sea turtle nests and four staff from the the Bureau of Meteorology

The plant in the US state of California stores enough energy to power 20,000 homes for four hours.

Milkham Inclosure, New Forest In the wartime effort of 1917 timber from this woodland fell to axes and became the battlefield planks trodden perhaps by the forest dwellers themselves

Today we wander through Milkham’s pines in an atmosphere of autumnal tranquillity. During the first world war the scene would have been very different. The ring of axes would have cut through the air as still more trees needed for the war effort were taken down. A few mother trees were spared to provide seedlings for regeneration.

One hundred years ago last week, after appalling cost, the Third Battle of Ypres, Passchendaele, ended. Pictures taken at the time show Australian gunners walking on duckboards across seas of mud, heading for the frontline through stick-like trees. They could have been treading on planks cut from pines that once grew in Milkham. A sombre thought.

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UN climate talks finish with progress on technical issues but with questions on carbon cuts unresolved.

The US president's move comes a day after US hunters were told they could import elephant trophies.

A Nasa oceanographer explains how the US space agency successfully captured 20 years of changing seasons to form a striking new global map. The projection of the Earth and its biosphere is derived from two decades of satellite data from September 1997 to September 2017

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Altering the gene which codes for production of a key enzyme could reduce the toad’s effect on wildlife.

As the UN climate change conference ends, BBC Science's David Shukman takes a look at melting ice caps.

Chancellor to announce call for evidence on possible measures to cut use of plastics such as takeaway cartons and packaging

The chancellor, Philip Hammond, will announce in next week’s budget a “call for evidence” on how taxes or other charges on single-use plastics such as takeaway cartons and packaging could reduce the impact of discarded waste on marine and bird life, the Treasury has said.

The commitment was welcomed by environmental and wildlife groups, though they stressed that any eventual measures would need to be ambitious and coordinated.

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How green building is moving from niche to normal.