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While Tim Peake has been in space he has handed out Brit Awards, run the London Marathon, and even done a spacewalk.

From Tibetan monks playing basket ball with ice thawing high up in the Himalayas, to the pollution that hides behind the Taj Mahal, here’s our pick from 60 exceptional environmental photographs, by photographers and filmmakers from 70 countries, that will go on show at the Royal Geographical Society in London from 29 June to 21 August. The winners will be announced on 28 June

• Photographs provided by the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management
  

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Captured by the XL Catlin Seaview Survey, these images show the extent of coral bleaching in the Indian Ocean archipelago of the Maldives. Scientists say this and similar devastation elsewhere in the world, including Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, are visible evidence of the impact of global warming

• Coral bleaching spreads to Maldives, devastating spectacular reefs

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Exclusive: Images from the Indian Ocean archipelago reveal the extent of the longest global coral bleaching event in history

• Coral bleaching in the Maldives – in pictures

The longest global coral bleaching event in history is now devastating reefs in the crystal clear waters of the Maldives, with images released exclusively to the Guardian powerfully illustrating the extent of the damage there.

Photographed by the XL Catlin Seaview Survey, the images captured the event in May as it moved beyond the now devastated Great Barrier Reef and into waters further west.

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Inclusion of the Warkworth Sands Woodland of the Hunter Valley on the list of threatened ecological communities, in the critically endangered category.

In 1991, Australia and other Antarctic Treaty Parties signed The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty. It provides for the comprehensive protection of Antarctica's environment and bans mining and oil drilling.

Pact addresses concerns that burgeoning output from renewables is putting strain on electricity grid and pushing up prices

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has hammered out a deal with state premiers on the latest reform to Germany’s renewable energy law aimed at curbing the costs and controlling the speed of the roll-out of green power sources.

After a meeting with the leaders of Germany’s 16 states that stretched into the early hours of Wednesday, the government agreed to cap the expansion of onshore wind power at 2.8 gigawatts in capacity per year.

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Registrations open for Redflow tour and seminar, plus making Australia a renewable energy superpower

Returning to Alan Bennett’s old street to shoot The Lady in the Van threw up surprises for residents and crew

When a decrepit van, filled with a homeless old lady’s flotsam and jetsam, appeared with a film crew on Gloucester Crescent, 25 years after a similar vehicle had last been seen there, it proved a popular addition to the street for two people in particular.

“Camden Town is party central and when the crew turned up on one Monday morning they found a couple who’d been having a good time in the van,” says director Nicholas Hytner. “They’d apparently been there all weekend.

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The world added far more renewable energy sources than fossil fuels in 2015, with developing countries overtaking richer nations on green spending.

WATER SOURCE: Water-rich asteroids that bombarded the Moon between 4.5 billion and 4.3 billion years ago were the main source of water in the Moon's interior, suggests a new study.

MSPs will vote on whether to impose a full ban on fracking as part of an environment debate at Holyrood.

The world's longest, deepest rail tunnel just opened

The Australian Greens leader examines coral bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef while snorkelling at Lizard Island in Queensland. Richard Di Natale also dives at Michaelmas Cay, where he is joined by his deputy, Senator Larissa Waters. All footage provided by the Australian Greens

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Putting gorillas behind steel and glass might seem harsh, but these barriers help keep them safe. Tim/Zoo Atlanta Flickr/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

The death of Harambe, a 17-year-old silverback Western lowland gorilla shot dead by Cincinnati Zoo staff after a four-year-old boy fell into his enclosure, has sparked anger and controversy.

One lesson we can take from this sad episode is the need to be realistic about the conditions in which gorillas and other captive animals live. If we accept that gorillas are going to be kept in zoos, we need to make sure those zoos don’t fail these animals by letting situations like this arise.

Harambe and the young boy.

Gorillas are obviously potentially dangerous to humans. We are a danger to them too, not least because our genetic closeness makes gorillas vulnerable to many human diseases.

As unpalatable as it seems to zoo visitors who might want to see animals living as “naturally” as possible, gorillas need to be kept behind glass, steel mesh or wide divides – for their own safety as well as ours.

Safety-first zoo design

One of the biggest questions about the Cincinnati Zoo incident is how the young boy could so easily have fallen into Harambe’s enclosure and come into direct contact with him. In light of this, there are certain principles that can be followed for the safe design of enclosures for large animals.

If an outdoor enclosure has some type of moat for containment, it may be a deep concrete moat with shallow water (less than 50cm) for gorillas to use without risk of drowning (gorillas can’t swim).

According to one set of recommendations, the typical minimum barrier should be 3.65 m high and 3.65 m across, but there is no law concerning minimum standards for gorilla enclosures. For extra security, a second barrier, sometimes electrified, is needed to keep people away.

In terms of minimum standards, the Cincinnati Zoo enclosure is suitable. But for great apes such as gorillas, it should no longer be acceptable simply to meet minimum standards. This is as true for containment as it is for the animals' other needs: space, complexity, and behavioural and psychological stimulation. The cost of building optimal enclosures for gorillas runs into millions of dollars, which places constraints on zoos who rarely have the funds to upgrade or redevelop enclosures. Who should fund these improvements?

All zoos have regulations and procedures to follow for risk management, including animal escape and recapture. Additional precautions are taken for all incidents or interactions with those considered dangerous species (such as big cats, great apes, elephants and so on).

There are strict legal requirements for protecting the public. But because of the rarity of such events, zoo staff may be inexperienced with situations involving human intruders (accidental or otherwise) in an exhibit.

Are gorillas ‘gentle giants’?

In 1996, a three-year-old boy fell into a similar enclosure at Brookfield Zoo. While the zoo visitors were also screaming and yelling, an eight-year-old female gorilla, Binti Jua, “rescued” the boy by carrying him to zoo staff at a side entrance. As animal researcher Marc Bekoff points out, Binti Jua was hailed as a gentle “heroine”, whereas Harambe was treated as a threat, but in both cases the gorillas were in situations where they had no control over the outcome.

It is impossible to say for certain whether Harambe would have become aggressive. He appeared to show behavioural signs of stress – hardly surprising given that people were shouting and screaming at him. Gorillas are sensitive and respond to non-verbal behaviour, such as towering over them or staring at them, which can be seen as a threat.

When faced with a stressful, noisy and threatening situation, gorillas – like most other animals, humans included – have a physiological “fight or flight” response. It is hard to predict how any individual will react under stress, but based on the video footage, Harambe did not appear to be behaving aggressively.

Silverbacks are powerful animals, weighing up to 180kg. When they are living in stable groups and not facing a threat, they are indeed gentle, but adult silverbacks can engage in infanticide when taking over a new family group.

A 2005 study found that the behaviour and welfare of gorillas in zoos are influenced by the number of people nearby, how close they are, and how much noise they are making. While zoo visitors can behave in almost any way they want, in the wild there are strict guidelines for tourists visiting gorillas.

To avoid disease transmission, behavioural disturbance and stress for wild gorillas, tourists who visit their native habitats must be over the age of 16, and in groups of no more than eight. The guidelines allow them to spend one hour quietly watching from a distance of about 10m.

Gorillas may be “gentle giants” when treated with respect and awe, but they are so much stronger than us.

Wild gorillas: look, but don’t touch. Augustine Tours/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY Expectations vs reality

When gorillas are housed in zoos, their exhibits must be designed from three perspectives: the safety and wellbeing of gorillas in the enclosure; the safety and satisfaction of visitors; and the safety and ease of maintenance by keepers and other staff.

These aims aren’t always mutually compatible. Zoo visitors might expect gorillas to be visible, active and “entertaining”, whereas the gorillas themselves are likely to seek quiet, secluded areas, and to spend much of their day resting or foraging.

Zoos and wild gorilla tourism sites must manage their visitors' expectations, so that all visitors understand that animal welfare and comfort take priority over optimal viewing.

We also can’t pretend that gorillas have control over their lives in captivity or even in natural habitats. They are impacted by human activities in all the places they live. Conservation is far more complicated than merely ensuring that gorillas have somewhere to live.

Zoo-based management programs have to deal with issues such as providing long-term care for old gorillas, who can reach 50 years of age. Captive breeding programs also have to deal with a “surplus” of males, because only a subset of silverbacks form family units or harems, which feature multiple females. In the wild there are many different group formations, including those with multiple silverbacks, but in captivity it is harder to manage social groups, as there is rarely space to separate individuals when aggression occurs.

Meanwhile, sanctuaries in Africa are struggling to care for orphaned gorillas as a result of the bushmeat trade. There is no truly safe wild haven for gorillas. Populations of critically endangered Western Lowland gorillas are declining, mainly as a result of the Ebola virus, which has killed thousands of gorillas in the Congo Basin, as well as commercial hunting and human disease.

Do gorillas belong in zoos? Why do zoo visitors want to see large animals in urban zoos? Are gorillas safer in the wild than inside enclosures and, if so, where? These are questions on which there will inevitably be strong differences of opinion.

But one thing we should all agree on is that we must strive to be compassionate and foster peaceful co-existence between people and other species, and work towards creating safe environments for gorillas with minimal human impact.

We can’t pretend that a moated enclosure without bars is any less of a cage than one with mesh. If keeping them safe in a zoo means putting a bigger barrier between us and them, or only letting us view them via hidden cameras as they live in a more protected and secluded exhibit, then so be it.

Carla Litchfield does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

Water found deep in the Moon was delivered when icy asteroids splashed into magma oceans 4.3 billion years ago, a study suggests.

Orcas exist in every ocean, adapting to different conditions and diets. Genome sequencing has allowed insights into their evolution - and similarity to humans

Geneticists have deciphered the brief history of the killer whale: the predator that exists in every ocean but has evolved over the generations to hunt in disciplined packs, and specialise in a range of diets.

The lesson is that genetic mutations that may have favoured survival in changing circumstances were then enhanced by natural selection – and by social learning within killer whale family groups.

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Cars and houses are buried in rubble after extreme floods hit parts of south-west Germany. Streets in Braunsbach were strewn with debris after two streams burst their banks. Four people have died, including a firefighter. Much of Germany and Europe experienced heavy rain and thunder storms over the weekend

• Four dead after severe floods hit southern Germany

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The EU referendum has united an often fractious industry, with skippers in ports from northern Scotland to Cornwall desperate to dump imposed quotas

William Whyte has a new flag flying from the rigging of his vast blue-hulled trawler, its fabric snapping in the brisk breeze coming in off the North Sea. It features the cartoon of a militant-looking fish wearing armour, a union jack shield at its waist and the legend “Fishing for Leave”.

These flags are appearing on boats around Britain’s coast. The country’s trawlermen are placing themselves in the vanguard of the campaign to quit the EU. There is talk of a flotilla massing on the Thames, as the country’s fishing fleets press the case for Brexit.

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Scientists in California are testing a spongy material made with the key ingredient of baking soda as means of capturing carbon emissions.