The Guardian

Homeowners across Australia will be flinging open their doors this Saturday and inviting curious visitors in to inspect their credentials on Sustainable House Day. Guardian Australia takes a closer look at a few of the inspiring properties that have upped the energy efficiency ante. Visit sustainablehouseday.com for for more information

Almost 100,000 sq km of Coral Sea, including important coral reefs, could lose protection from fishing under changes recommended in Abbott-era review

Australia’s commonwealth marine parks could be significantly cut back, under recommendations that almost 100,000 sq km of the Coral Sea, including important coral reefs, lose their protection from fishing.

The network of 42 marine reserves was announced by Labor in 2012 after years of consultation and consideration of more than 8,000 submissions. It was welcomed by environmental groups but was designed to have minimal impact on commercial activities, which sparked some criticism from conservationists and scientists.

Norwich How odd that UEA, a place renowned for its pioneering role in academic conservation, should contemplate ruining these grasslands with a huge car park and artificial grass pitches

When I first went to the University of East Anglia more than 30 years ago it struck me as odd that the 32 acres of encircling grasslands were maintained as if they were a golf course. Flayed to within an inch of its life, the sward was absolutely useless for biodiversity.

How times change. Today, aside from a network of cut trails, which give access to hundreds if not thousands of local people who use this city park daily, it is a low-level forest of flower-rich vegetation.

Worker at sanctuary suffers cuts to her face after entering eagle enclosure on Tuesday morning

A wedge-tailed eagle has attacked a female staff member at the Gold Coast’s Currumbin wildlife sanctuary, leaving her with cuts to her face.

The woman, believed to be in her 30s, was attacked at about 8.30am on Tuesday and was taken to Gold Coast university hospital in a stable condition.

Council unanimously passes motion calling for policy that would remove more than $500m from banks that invest in fossil fuels

The City of Sydney council is set to divest from fossil fuels this year, regardless of the outcome of the election on Saturday, after a two-year campaign by members of the anti-fossil fuel group 350.org.

The council has more than $500m under management. At the last meeting before the election, it unanimously passed a motion calling for a new investment policy that would divert those funds away from banks that invest in fossil fuels.

Panorama programme claims there are numerous, potentially lethal safety flaws at the Cumbria nuclear plant

The Sellafield nuclear site is riddled with potentially lethal safety flaws, according to a BBC investigation.

The Panorama programme, broadcast on Monday night, uncovered a raft of safety issues on the site in Cumbria which stores almost all of the country’s nuclear waste.

Detection of ‘abundant’ magnetite particles raises concerns because of suggested links to Alzheimer’s disease

Toxic nanoparticles from air pollution have been discovered in human brains in “abundant” quantities, a newly published study reveals.

The detection of the particles, in brain tissue from 37 people, raises concerns because recent research has suggested links between these magnetite particles and Alzheimer’s disease, while air pollution has been shown to significantly increase the risk of the disease. However, the new work is still a long way from proving that the air pollution particles cause or exacerbate Alzheimer’s.

John Harris provides, as usual, an excellent piece on what is wrong with British politics (Politics can’t heal until politicians stand clear of the revolving door, 3 September). However, former politicians and functionaries moving to lucrative jobs in the private sector and people from the private sector moving to less lucrative but influential positions in government is neither new nor a particularly British or European malady. What is missing from Harris and sadly from the Guardian in general is the recognition that this is how capitalism works at home, and is a key feature of how capitalism works globally.

How often do we hear the plea from politicians, functionaries, and corporate executives exposed for questionable practices that they were “doing nothing wrong”. In the strictly legal sense this is often correct, but it only highlights how capitalism and the state work hand in hand. Corporate sponsorship of the Paris climate change meetings is only the most important of recent manifestations of this phenomenon, in this case not only helping to explain why people around the world appear to be losing faith in conventional politics, but also why so little is done to get to the roots of why fossil-fuelled capitalist globalisation has been allowed to put the very existence of the planet at serious risk.
Leslie Sklair
London

IUCN report warns that ‘truly staggering’ rate of warming is changing the behaviour of marine species, reducing fishing zones and spreading disease

The soaring temperature of the oceans is the “greatest hidden challenge of our generation” that is altering the make-up of marine species, shrinking fishing areas and starting to spread disease to humans, according to the most comprehensive analysis yet of ocean warming.

The oceans have already sucked up an enormous amount of heat due to escalating greenhouse gas emissions, affecting marine species from microbes to whales, according to an International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) report involving the work of 80 scientists from a dozen countries.

Giant storms that wreak havoc across China, Japan, Korea and the Philippines have grown 50% stronger in the past 40 years due to warming seas

The destructive power of the typhoons that wreak havoc across China, Japan, Korea and the Philippines has intensified by 50% in the past 40 years due to warming seas, a new study has found.

Fans of the panda are celebrating its removal from the endangered list – and it’s not the only species to have been pulled back from the brink

The most famous thing about pandas, apart from them spending all day eating bamboo and not having sex, is how endangered they are. However, the animal has just been moved off the “endangered” species list by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Although the giant panda is still considered “vulnerable”, its population is much healthier – there are thought to be 1,864 adults, and although there isn’t a definitive number of cubs, the total population now exceeds 2,000. It is, noted the IUCN report, “a positive sign confirming that the Chinese government’s efforts to conserve this species are effective”. Few conservation measures have been as intensive or high profile. The work included increasing the number of panda reserves, protecting forests (such as reforestation and banning logging in panda habitats) and creating “corridors” so isolated wild panda populations can mix and strengthen the gene pool. Anti-poaching patrols, and moving humans out of reserves also helped. Pandas are still at risk, particularly from a reduction in bamboo availability due to climate change, but it shows conservation efforts pay off. Here are some other animals that have been brought back from the brink:

Letter from 36 MPs urges Theresa May to redirect billions of pounds of post-Brexit subsidies towards environmental and public services

Dozens of Conservative MPs have written to the prime minister, Theresa May, urging her to shift billions of pounds of post-Brexit farm subsidies towards protecting and improving the environment.

The 36 MPs, including former environment ministers, also urge May to maintain the strong protection for wildlife and water provided by EU directives. During the EU referendum campaign, farming minister George Eustice campaigned for the leave camp and said the directives were “spirit-crushing” and “would go”.

Authority’s recommendations will ‘sanction further delay’ with ‘serious consequences’ for Australia, minority report says

Despite its brevity, the dissenting report from two members of the government’s supposedly independent Climate Change Authority has landed with a dull and uncompromising thud.

Last week the CCA published its report advising the government what it should and shouldn’t do in the wake of the Paris climate agreement. In short, the report recommended the government keep the chief pillars of its current policies, but make a few tweaks here and there.

A selection of images which document a family common weasels throughout the seasons scoop the top prize this year.

Winning images are chosen from thousands of entries in fifteen separate categories including a special film category for Wildlife in HD Video and two junior categories to encourage young people to connect with nature through photography. For more information see the awards website.

Mosques across Morocco will be fitted with solar energy systems in government scheme to boost clean energy awareness

Six hundred “green mosques” are to be created in Morocco by March 2019 in a national consciousness-raising initiative that aims to speed the country’s journey to clean energy.

If all goes to plan, the green revamp will see LED lighting, solar thermal water heaters and photovoltaic systems installed in 100 mosques by the end of this year.

The Chevin, Otley, West Yorkshire The most prolific plants spring up to monstrous heights and otherwise orderly places become twisted and tangled

There is a point every summer where the pastoral dream of the English countryside turns feverish, almost psychedelic. The most prolific plants spring up to monstrous heights and otherwise orderly places become twisted and tangled. In Yorkshire’s gritstone country, these individual takeovers feel like a conspiracy, as if the armies of entropy are silently massing, taking up positions ready for some coordinated coup of the countryside.

QUT vice-chancellor says university’s $300m endowment fund will divest its shares in coal, oil and gas companies

One of Australia’s largest universities, the Queensland University of Technology, has committed to dumping fossil fuel investments after a two-year campaign by students and staff.

In a move that surprised and delighted campaigners, the university’s vice-chancellor, Peter Coaldrake, revealed on Friday the university’s $300m endowment fund would divest its shares in coal, oil and gas companies.

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 8 September 1916

The autumnal touch of morning mist reveals the fact that spiders are more numerous than we imagine. Over the hedge-top, slung between the garden plants stretched across the road and pathway, and suspended beneath the bushes are innumerable lines, nets, and traps, all carefully prepared to ensnare the heedless fly or other insect. They are there, these nets, on every summer day, but it is only when the moisture ropes them with scintillating minute drops –

“every fairy wheel and thread
Of cobweb dew-bediamonded” –*

Climate scientist and economist publish minority report calling for full emissions trading scheme and closure of brown-coal-fired power plants

The Climate Change Authority’s latest report is a “recipe for further delay” on climate change, contravenes the authority’s legal obligations and recommends “a dog’s breakfast” of policies, say two key members in a dissenting minority report.

Climate scientist David Karoly and economist Clive Hamilton said they could not “in good conscience” put their name to the majority report, which they said privileged “political feasibility” over environmental effectiveness and economic efficiency.

Largest living primate joins three other great ape species on International Union for Conservation of Nature’s red list

Humanity has moved a step closer to wiping out our closest evolutionary relatives, with four of the six great ape species now listed internationally as critically endangered.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has listed the eastern gorilla, the largest living primate, as critically endangered in its latest “red list” of threatened species. The eastern gorilla has suffered a 70% population collapse over the past 20 years, primarily due to illegal hunting.