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Great Barrier Reef: tourists will go elsewhere if bleaching continues – poll
Survey shows a majority of Chinese tourists and about a third of US and UK visitors will travel to somewhere other than Australia
If the bleaching continues on the Great Barrier Reef, tourists say they will pack their bags and go elsewhere, taking with them an estimated $1bn a year and costing 10,000 jobs in regional Queensland, according to a new poll.
The majority of Chinese tourists, and about a third of UK and US tourists, said if severe bleaching continues, and “some of the reef dies completely,” they would be more likely to visit somewhere other than Australia, according to the online polling of more than 4,000 people commissioned by the Australia Institute
Continue reading...Mass elephant relocation could save populations in parts of Africa
Experts in Malawi will move 500 elephants 185 miles across the country to a sanctuary that will act as a ‘reservoir’
Wildlife experts in Malawi will next month start moving up to 500 elephants to a sanctuary that they hope could eventually serve as a reservoir to restore some elephant populations in other parts of Africa where the threatened species has been heavily poached.
The massive relocation, slated for completion next year, will involve darting the elephants from a helicopter, hoisting the slumbering animals by crane and loading them in crates on to trucks for a ride of about 185 miles (300km) to Malawi’s Nkhotakota wildlife reserve.
Continue reading...Cruel summer: how you should use today’s extra daylight – if you must
Today is a once in a lifetime event: the longest day of the year, first day of summer and a full ‘strawberry’ moon – which means it’s time to go outside
As if today being Monday wasn’t bad enough, it’s also the longest day of the year. Now, if you’ve spent the last nine months shuttling between your office and your apartment glimpsing only a smidgeon of sunshine in between, all this extra daytime can come as a shock. Suddenly it’s not quite so acceptable to spend your free time in a dark room watching Netflix ignoring everyone except the delivery person. You have to go outside and do outside stuff. You have to, you know, have fun in the sun.
So, how should you use today’s extra daylight? If you’re a Druid, Pagan, Wiccan or Swede you’ve probably got your plans sorted and have a nice maypole or prehistoric monument to convene around. If you don’t have any rituals planned, however, here are a few ways you can use the longest day of the year to its full advantage.
Continue reading...Environmental activist murders set record as 2015 became deadliest year
Global Witness says at least 185 activists were killed and anti-mining activities were the most deadly – with 42 deaths related to protests
At least 185 environmental activists were killed last year, the highest annual death toll on record and close to a 60% increase on the previous year, according to a UK-based watchdog.
Global Witness documented lethal attacks across 16 countries. Brazil was worst hit with 50 deaths, many of them killings of campaigners who were trying to combat illegal logging in the Amazon. The Philippines was second with 33.
Continue reading...How early mammals evolved night vision to escape dinos
China to generate a quarter of electricity from wind power by 2030
Report says figures could rise to nearly one-third with power sector reforms, making it the world wind energy leader by a large margin
China is on track to generate more than a quarter of its electricity from wind power by 2030, and the figure could rise to nearly a third with power sector reforms, a new study has found.
Within 14 years, more new generating capacity – mostly clean energy – will come online in China than currently exists in the whole of the US, further cementing the country’s image as a burgeoning green giant.
Continue reading...Project re-ignited
China builds world's most powerful computer
Saiga antelope numbers rise after mass die-off
A recent aerial survey has revealed that the numbers of all three saiga populations in Kazakhstan are going up, Mongabay reports
Last year, catastrophe hit saiga antelopes in Kazakhstan. About 200,000 of these critically endangered antelopes died in Betpak-Dala in May, deeply worrying conservationists. The deaths, scientists eventually found, were most likely caused by bacterial infection.
But there may be hope for these severely threatened migratory mammals.
Continue reading...Three environmental activists killed each week in 2015
Global Witness figures show last year was the deadliest for environment and land campaigners since 2002
Three environmental activists were killed per week last year, murdered defending land rights and the environment from mining, dam projects and logging, a campaign group said on Monday.
In 16 countries surveyed in a report by Global Witness, 185 activists were killed, making 2015 the deadliest year for environment and land campaigners since 2002.
Continue reading...Solar Impulse 2 begins transatlantic stretch of global journey
Solar-powered plane sets off from JFK airport on the transatlantic leg of its record-breaking flight to promote renewable energy
The sun-powered Solar Impulse 2 aircraft set off from New York’s JFK airport early on Monday, embarking on the transatlantic leg of its record-breaking flight around the world to promote renewable energy.
The flight, piloted by Swiss adventurer Bertrand Piccard, is expected to take about 90 hours - during which Piccard will only take short naps - before landing at Spain’s Seville airport.
Continue reading...New methods are improving ocean and climate measurements | John Abraham
Improvements to ocean temperature measurements are making good measurements great
I have often said that global warming is really ocean warming. As humans add more heat-trapping gases to the atmosphere, it causes the Earth to gain energy. Almost all of that energy ends up in the oceans. So, if you want to know how fast the Earth is warming, you have to measure how fast the oceans are heating up.
Sounds easy enough at first, but when we recognize that the oceans are vast (and deep) we can appreciate the difficulties. How can we get enough measurements, at enough locations, and enough depths, to measure the oceans’ temperatures? Not only that, but since climate change is a long-term trend, it means we have to measure ocean temperature changes over many years and decades. We really want to know how fast the oceans’ temperatures are changing over long durations.
Continue reading...Trusting tap water
Solar Impulse sets off on 90-hour Atlantic crossing
Shot in the dark: the animals who shun sunlight – in pictures
From deep inside caves to the bottom of the ocean, wildlife photographer Danté Fenolio seeks out the creatures that don’t want to be found
Continue reading...European commission warned of car emissions test cheating, five years before VW scandal
Documents seen by Guardian show that the commission’s in-house science service told it in 2010 that tests had uncovered what researchers suspected to be a ‘defeat device’
The European commission was warned by its own experts that a car maker was suspected of cheating emissions tests five years before the VW emissions scandal.
A documents cache seen by the Guardian show that the commission’s in-house science service told it in 2010 that tests had uncovered what researchers suspected to be a “defeat device” that could cheat emissions tests.
Continue reading...Cambridge University rejects calls to divest from fossil fuels
Working group on investment responsibility argues it is better to keep investments in oil and gas companies, rather than divest £5.9bn endowment
The University of Cambridge has rejected calls to divest its £5.9bn endowment from fossil fuels, as students, academics and the former archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams have called for.
In a report on Friday, the university ruled out future investments in coal and tar sands, although it currently has no direct holdings in either, and only negligible holdings in coal by investments managed externally.
Recent storms uncover shipwrecks on Tasmania’s coastline
Diverse coastal wildlife out on display: Country diary 100 years ago
Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 20 June 1916
June 19.
Deep purple marsh orchids pushed their sturdy, densely-packed heads through the damp turf, and graceful white flowers hung from the upright stalks of the wintergreens. These were in the level spaces between the dunes, but on the sand itself the pink-flowered bindweeds were out, trailing up the slopes and striving to hold the shifting grains. Good as the bindweed is, it is less effective than the restharrow, whose sticky leaves were dusted with blown particles though its matted roots held firm enough, firmer even than the marram grass, actually planted to stop the shifting of the sand.
Blue butterflies enjoyed the sunshine, settling to close their bright wings when a cloud obscured the sun, and lizards lay basking, but not sleeping, almost invisible upon the sand. Predatory tiger beetles, green gems, quartered the slopes like sporting dogs, then rising, whisked down wind to the next dune; and large, metallic-coated flies, their prey, dropped on the warm sand for a moment, ready to dart off sideways from even the shadow of the foe. The ringed plover whistled plaintively as it strove to lure us from the neighbourhood of its nest, now flying, now running swiftly to attract our attention, but the noisy redshanks, well dubbed “yelpers,” kept up an incessant din as they rapidly flew round and round, or passed above, yelping hard, with quivering wings and expanded, wedge-shaped tails.
Continue reading...Willow warbler: our commonest, and most inconspicuous, summer migrant
The willow warbler, easily confused with other visitors, breeds throughout Britain, from Cornwall to Shetland
What’s the commonest summer visitor to our shores? The swallow perhaps, or the swift? The house martin, or the blackcap?
Actually it’s the willow warbler – a bird not all that many people have heard of, let alone heard. Yet the silvery, shivery song of this tiny, leaf-like sprite is the accompaniment to the burgeoning of spring – from the Isles of Scilly in the south to Shetland in the north.
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