The Guardian

Event will take place from 2-13 December as planned after Spain intervenes to save talks

The world’s governments will meet in Madrid this December to discuss the climate emergency, it has been confirmed, after a last-minute intervention by the Spanish government to save the talks.

The conference had been set to take place in Santiago, Chile, but the government of President Sebastian Pinera decided on Wednesday to call it off because of the unrest in the capital. Scores of people have been left dead and injured in weeks of rioting over economic inequality and social problems.

Country has changed definition of waste, which campaigners far could lead to imports of low-grade plastic scraps

Argentina has changed its definition of waste in a move that could allow it to import millions of tonnes of plastic waste discarded in the US.

The country’s president, Mauricio Macri, signed a decree in August reclassifying some materials destined for recycling as commodities instead of waste, allowing looser oversight of mixed and contaminated plastic scraps that are difficult to process, and are often dumped or incinerated.

From the punks of the bird world and a living fossil to a rabbit-killing raptor, Australia’s birds have attitude

• Vote for your favourite in the bird of the year poll

Common pesticides found to starve fish ‘astoundingly fast’ by killing aquatic insects

The Silent Spring prophecy that pesticides could “still the leaping of fish” has been confirmed, according to scientists investigating the collapse of fisheries in Japan. They say similar impacts are likely to have occurred around the world.

The long-term study showed an immediate plunge in insect and plankton numbers in a large lake after the introduction of neonicotinoid pesticides to rice paddies. This was rapidly followed by the collapse of smelt and eel populations, which had been stable for decades but rely on the tiny creatures for food.

Environmentalist who first calculated the damage caused by clearing tropical rainforests to raise cattle for hamburgers

Norman Myers, who has died of dementia aged 85, was the scientist who first calculated that every year, worldwide, an area of tropical rainforest the size of England and Wales was burned, bulldozed or felled to ranch beef for US hamburgers.

That, more than 40 years ago, was not orthodoxy. Satellite imagery over the next decade proved him right. He also predicted – and explained his reasoning, in his second book, The Sinking Ark (1979) – that species were being extinguished at the rate of one a day, rather than the accepted figure of one a year. This too was challenged, and later Myers conceded he had been wrong; he should have said 50 species a day.

The fairy penguins under my shack are gone, and soon the forty-spotted pardalotes and swift parrots will join them. Our children knew these birds; their children will not

• Vote for your favourite in the 2019 bird of the year poll
  

I am not a twitcher’s binocular strap, but I adore birds. I watch birds for hours. Their freedom and joy move me. Something in their play and way suggest minds far different than ours. A man I once met who kept cockatoos told me that you have to be careful because they fuck with your head.

And they do.

Decision would mark U-turn for PM, who once said fracking was ‘glorious news for humanity’

• General election latest - live

The prime minister could be poised to sound the death knell for the UK’s controversial shale gas industry after more than a decade of support for fracking, according to sources.

Boris Johnson is expected to rule out any new fracking in the UK as part of his election campaign following rising opposition to fracking among voters, and within his own party.

Our team of environment writers from around the world reflects on the urgency and breadth of the climate crisis, and the role of readers in making our coverage possible

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George Monbiot, columnist and author of several books on the climate crisis

Before I worked for the Guardian, I tried writing for other newspapers, in the belief I should reach the unconverted. But I gradually discovered that all of them were intensely hostile to thoughtful explorations of ecological and climate breakdown. In total, I was commissioned to write 26 articles. All but two were spiked. Eventually I realised it was impossible to cover these crucial issues properly without supportive editors. Reluctantly at first, I started writing for the Guardian in the early 1990s. Across most of this period, it has been the only paper that has consistently supported powerful writing about the gathering collapse of our life support systems. Now, with your help, it is devoting unprecedented resources to the greatest predicament humankind has ever faced. Thanks to your support, I will keep writing about every aspect of our environmental crisis, always striving to dig deeper and to understand more.

The response from Guardian readers around the world to our recently launched climate pledge has been overwhelming, and given us even more determination to put this urgent issue front and centre of our journalism

• Support Guardian journalism today, by making a single or recurring contribution, or subscribing
  

Thank you to all the readers and Guardian supporters around the world who have responded to our environmental pledge, in which we outlined five important journalistic and institutional steps we will take to play a leading role in reporting on the climate catastrophe. The response has been overwhelming, with thousands of you across more than 100 countries making the choice to support us with a contribution.

Many of you have told us how much you value our commitment: to be truthful, resolute and undeterred in pursuing this important journalism. We made this pledge because we recognise the climate emergency as the defining issue of our lifetimes.

Researchers found only two living koalas after fires burned through the native marsupial’s breeding ground in north-eastern NSW

Bushfires sweeping through prime koala habitat in New South Wales may have killed as many as 350 of the iconic native marsupial, conservationists say.

The blaze, near Port Macquarie in northern NSW, has burned through thousands of hectares including an important koala breeding ground.

Scientists say policymakers must better account for climate impacts of damage to forests, and benefits of conserving them

Greenhouse gas emissions caused by damage to tropical rainforests around the world are being underestimated by a factor of six, according to a new study.

Research led by the University of Queensland finds the climate impact of selective logging, outright clearing and fire in tropical rainforests between 2000 and 2013 was underestimated by 6.53bn tonnes of CO2.

This series is funded, in part, through grants to theguardian.org by the following organisations

I ended up incorporating him into my novel Carpentaria, where he now looms larger than life

• Vote for your favourite in the 2019 bird of the year poll

This is a story of Pirate, Australia’s proper number one rex regum et volucres, king of birds. As a fledging, so I was told, he was rescued in a relocation of sulphur-crested cockatoos from the vicinity of Tullamarine airport, so that he would not end up being a bird-strike victim caught up in a jet turbine of one of those long-haul international Boeing jetliners taking off at about 190mph to Hong Kong, London, Paris or wherever else these people carriers fly to on the planet.

This wild young cockatoo was taken to central Australia, where the skies would eventually be large enough for his freewheeling temperament to roam. Within days of arriving in Alice Springs he came to live with my family as a basically wild, and seemingly untameable, rebellious adolescent. He hated everyone and hissed like a mad white ghost whenever anyone went near his cage. Every day I talked to him, paid him many compliments for his extraordinary beauty, and gave him the name of Pirate. Somehow I managed to clean his cage with all the newspapers he ripped up without having my hand bitten off while he was going completely bananas, and then I brought him fresh gumtree foliage to beautify his home, which he destroyed along with the newspaper, and gave him saucers of cut-up fruit, vegetables, seed and water. In other words, he was the boss and I was his slave.

In the UK’s first ‘plastic-free’ town, Penzance, there is consternation at the arrival of 150 artificial trees, amid suggestions that this is the most environmentally friendly option

Residents of Penzance, Cornwall, the UK’s first “plastic-free” town, were understandably piqued this week to find that 150 Christmas trees had been put up – every single one made of plastic.

Local business chiefs behind the move defended their decision to opt for fake trees for the community and insisted they were more sustainable than the fresh alternative – which would later have to be burned – and could be dusted off and reused for many years.

Scientists are developing rapid-charging batteries that could be in use in a couple of years

New battery technology could give electric cars more than 200 miles of charge in as little as 10 minutes, according to new research.

Lithium ion batteries have had a dramatic impact because of their ability to store a large amount of energy in a small, compact battery and be recharged again and again. A trio of scientists were awarded the Nobel prize in chemistry for their contributions to the development of the batteries earlier this month.

Firefighters in California have been battling wildfires across the state as winds are expected to pick up again. The Kincade fire in Sonoma county, in the north of the US state, had destroyed 124 homes and other structures by Tuesday morning and was threatening 90,000 structures. Crews were also working to control a fire near the Getty Museum in Los Angeles that had prompted evacuations on Monday

• California wildfires: fierce winds may spread blazes as millions lose power

Crude oil oozes into the waters of Lake Maracaibo – a large inlet of the Caribbean Sea – yet fishermen still scratch a living on its blackened, sticky shores

All photographs by Rodrigo Abd/AP

Organisations such as Australian Industry Group and National Farmers’ Federation letter says greater private-sector action needed

Industry, farming and investor groups say the federal government signed up to a goal of global net zero emissions under the Paris agreement and have warned unless new policies are introduced taxpayer spending on climate programs will need to be dramatically increased.

A joint letter by 10 business organisations, including the Australian Industry Group and the National Farmers’ Federation, says the government will either need to back new climate policies that drive private-sector action or boost taxpayer funding now and into the future.

The Society of German Nature Photographers has chosen its winners and runners-up. Below, some of the photographers explain how they captured their shots

Survey also finds two-thirds of people agree climate is biggest issue facing humankind

A majority of people in the UK say the climate crisis will influence how they vote in the looming general election, according to an opinion poll, with younger voters feeling particularly strongly about the issue.

Almost two-thirds of people agreed the climate emergency was the biggest issue facing humankind, with 7% disagreeing. The poll also asked if “fossil fuel companies, whose products contribute directly to climate change, should help pay for the tens of billions in damages from extreme weather events?” Two-thirds of people agreed, with 12% opposed.