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Green Alliance calls for making retailers take back bottles and cans to significantly reduce plastic pollution in seas

Plastic marine litter could be cut significantly if the government adopted a bottle deposit scheme as part of five key actions to tackle pollution of the oceans, a green thinktank has said.

The single most effective action to reduce plastic pollution in the seas would be a container return scheme along the lines of those run in large parts of Europe, north America and Australia, according to a new analysis by Green Alliance. In such schemes, a small tax is added to recyclable and reusable containers at the point of sale, which consumers can reclaim by returning them.

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Plymouth, Devon A busy harbour is not a place you’d expect to find much in the way of wildlife, so that bubble trail in the water is intriguing

This is a place of arrivals and departures, a centuries-old harbour where few stop for long. From hosting the steamships and trans-Atlantic liners of the past to today’s colossal cross-channel ferries, Plymouth’s historic Millbay dock has served the comings and goings of countless travellers.

On work lunch breaks I regularly walk beside the innermost basin, now transformed into a marina as part of the area’s regeneration. Solid harbour walls designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel provide shelter for luxury yachts neatly berthed along wooden pontoons.

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It may finally be dawning on the PM that it's not wind and solar pushing up cost of electricity, but profiteering of incumbent utilities.

Attempts to suggest coal power is cheaper than the plummeting cost of renewables look increasingly ridiculous and desperate.

Engie and GE commit to 119MW wind farm in South Australia, taking confirmed new wind and solar projects in that state to more than 600MW.

Australia's biggest coal miner and leading research organisation come up with ridiculous claims on battery storage in attempts to justify new coal plants and CCS.

Once, alternative energy meant "clean coal" and "fracking." Today, renewables have left those "alternatives" for dead, and not even Trump can save them.

Google's parent company has joined Tesla and other smaller companies, developing ways to store wind and solar affordably.

This well-timed Australian book offers a step-by-step how-to for businesses transitioning to a more sustainable energy future.

Most washing machines come with 25kg of concrete - but researchers claim there's a simple alternative.

Tough new emission standards proposed for Australia's light passenger vehicle fleet will save billions in fuel costs and cut carbon pollution, says ClimateWorks Australia.

Dedicated searches have revealed a rare butterfly back in its former Kent stronghold and gaining other territories

Britain’s most charismatic and elusive butterfly, the purple emperor, has a habit of turning up unannounced. This powerful, treetop, butterfly lives at low densities in the landscape but has been spotted in many new places thanks to the combination of a fine mid-summer and some astonishingly thorough searches by devotees.

Related: Interesting times for lepidopterists

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Government research finds drastic drop in people backing drilling for shale gas since the study was launched in 2012

Public support for fracking has reached a record low, according to the latest government research.

A survey by the Business and Energy Department showed just 16% supported the controversial process of shale gas extraction, down from 21% last year and the lowest since the study was launched five years ago.

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A new species of mega-herbivore dinosaur discovered in Alberta, Canada preserves incredible details of its skin, scales and spines.

Researchers have released the most accurate map ever produced of the dark matter in our Universe.

The interoceanic canal and its ‘murky legal framework’ was also criticized by former model Bianca Jagger, who called the canal ‘an insane project’

Nicaragua’s former revolutionary leaders have led a campaign of harassment and persecution against communities opposing the construction of a controversial canal that threatens the homes and livelihoods of tens of thousands of people, according to Amnesty International.

Plans to construct a $50bn shipping canal 175 miles long and 500 yards wide have provoked a mix of anger, fear and defiance not witnessed since the civil war between the Sandinista government and US-backed Contra rebels ended in 1988.

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VW, BMW, Opel and Daimler’s promise to fix 5 million cars not enough to undo the damage done by emissions scandal, say campaigners

Major car makers are being accused of clutching at straws after they agreed to fit software to 5m diesel vehicles in Germany to reduce harmful emissions by up to 30%.

VW, Daimler, BMW and Opel made the decision at a summit with leading politicians in Berlin. They have been under pressure since the diesel emissions scandal two years ago exposed how VW and – it is suspected – other manufacturers have been cheating the testing regime.

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Scott Pruitt claims change is testament to responsiveness but makes no mention of legal challenge over Obama-era rules to lessen ground-level ozone

One day after getting sued by 15 states, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief, Scott Pruitt, reversed his decision to delay implementation of Obama-era rules reducing emissions of smog-causing air pollutants.

Pruitt presented the change as his agency being more responsive than past administrations to the needs of state environmental regulators. He made no mention of the legal challenge filed against his prior position in a federal appeals court.

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Over four decades of exploration and extraction have caused an environmental and health crisis in indigenous communities

Who is going to clean up Peru’s northern Amazon after decades of companies spilling oil and dumping billions of barrels of toxic production waters? Certainly not US company Occidental which ran the biggest concession, Lot 1-AB, until 2000, nor, it would seem, Petroperu, which ran the other major concession, Lot 8, until 1996 and operates the rusty, leaking North Peruvian Pipeline to this day.

Nor Pluspetrol, a company founded in Argentina and now registered in the Netherlands which took over both Lot 1-AB and Lot 8, if its actions to date are anything to go by. Nor the China National Petroleum Corporation, which bought 45% stakes in both concessions in 2003. Nor the subsidiary of a Canadian company now called Frontera Energy which, in 2015, when Lot 1-AB’s name was effectively changed to Lot 192, bought 100% of operations in a two year temporary contract.

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Deforestation and climate change appear to be amplifying droughts in the Amazon

If you are like me, you picture the Amazon region as an ever lush, wet, tropical region filled with numerous plant and animal species. Who would imagine the Amazon experiencing drought? I mean sure, if we think of drought as “less water than usual,” then any place could have a drought. But what I tend to envision with respect to drought is truly dry.

People who work in this field have a more advanced understanding than I do about drought, how and why it occurs, its frequency and severity, and the impact on natural and human worlds. This recognition brings us to a very interesting paper recently published in Scientific Reports, entitled Unprecedented drought over tropical South America in 2016: significantly under-predicted by tropical SST [sea surface temperature]. So, what did this paper show?

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